A  STUDY 


OF 


ENGLISH    RHYME 


KY 

CHARLES    F.   RICHARDSON 

Professor  of  English  in  Dartmouth  College 


HANOVER,  N.  H. 

PRINTED    FOR    CLASS-ROOM    USE 

1909 


LIBRARY 

UNIVEHSITV  Of 


SAN  DIEGO 


&4 


A   STUDY 


OF 


ENGLISH    RHYME 


BY 

CHARLES   F.  RICHARDSON 

Professor  of  English  in  Dartmouth  College 


HANOVER,  N.  H. 

PRINTED    FOR    CLASS-ROOM&USE 

1909 


COPYRIGHT,  1909, 
BY  CHARLES  F.  RICHARDSON. 


THE  UNIVERSITY  PRESS,   CAMBRIDGE,   U.  S.  A. 


PEEFACE 

THIS  book  is  the  best  and  the  worst  on  its  theme,  for  there  is 
nq  other. 

Many  volumes  have  been  written  on  the  principles  and  prac- 
tice of  the  poetic  art;  but  none,  from  Sidney's  days  to  Saints- 
bury's,  has  been  wholly  devoted  to  the  nature  and  history  of 
English  rhyme.  The  rhyming  dictionaries,  such  as  Walker's, 
Barnum's,  or  Loring's,  have  naturally  contented  themselves 
with  vocabularies;  while  general  treatises  on  poetics  or  poetic 
history  have  usually  dismissed  rhyme  as  a  modern  phonetic 
pleasure  of  uncertain  origin.  Furthermore,  most  writers  on  the 
subject,  save  Schipper  and  his  followers,  have  ignored  the  rela- 
tion, which  ought  to  be  obvious,  between  alliteration,  assonance, 
and  end-rhyme,  as  different  forms  of  the  same  thing. 

The  purpose  of  the  present  work  is  to  try  to  trace  the  evolution 
of  English  rhyme,  and  to  correlate  it  with  physical  laws,  the 
growth  of  individual  or  communal  song,  and  the  history  of  the 
rhyme-art  in  other  European  tongues.  Collateral  attention  has 
therefore  been  given  to  alliteration  in  the  Teutonic  languages, 
assonance  in  Spanish,  and  end-rhyme  in  Latin,  Provencal,  Ital- 
ian, French,  and  German ;  but  it  was  manifestly  impossible,  in  a 
volume  of  small  size,  to  present  a  polyglot  or  comparative  history 
of  a  subject  of  such  indefinite  extent.  Indeed,  a  full  record  of 
English  rhyme  alone  would  demand,  for  its  presentation,  a 
library  almost  as  extensive  as  the  works  of  the  poets  discussed. 
It  has  therefore  been  my  attempt  to  give  the  leading  principles 
of  the  discussion,  leaving  applications  to  be  followed  at  the 
reader's  pleasure. 


iv  PREFACE 

Obligation  is  acknowledged,  in  greater  or  less  degree,  to  the 
volumes  cited  in  the  foot-notes.  Hundreds  of  others  have  been 
examined  —  pamphlets  and  treatises  of  such  varying  value  that  a 
bibliography  would  mislead  rather  than  aid  the  student.  A  word 
of  special  gratitude  belongs  to  Professor  G.  Gregory  Smith, 
whose  Elizabethan  Literary  Criticism  has  relieved  students  from 
the  search  for  rare  originals  or  sometimes  untrustworthy  reprints. 
In  general,  however,  I  have  relied  upon  first-hand  reading  of 
the  poetry  itself.  For  assistance  outside  my  immediate  field  I 
am  indebted  to  Louis  Bell,  Ph.D.,  of  Boston ;  Professor  Duncan 
C.  Macdonald  of  Hartford  Theological  Seminary;  Lucius 
Waterman,  D.D.,  Rector  of  St.  Thomas'  Church,  Hanover ;  my 
colleagues,  C.  N.  Gould,  P.  O.  Skinner,  E.  F.  Langley,  and  A.  K. 
Hardy,  of  the  faculty  of  Dartmouth  College;  and  Elizabeth 
Richardson. 

The  use  of  the  colon  between  rhyming  sounds  explains  itself. 
The  ordinary  ab  scheme  of  indicating  rhyming  lines  is  of  course 
followed.  In  a  few  cases  the  phonetic  symbols  of  the  New  Eng- 
lish Dictionary  have  been  used,  but  only  in  circumstances  ad- 
mitting little  doubt.  Even  contemporary  speech  is  an  uncertain 
or  variable  thing ;  poets  in  every  age  have  shown  a  large  margin 
of  freedom  in  their  rhyme-sounds;  while  the  application  of 
speech-symbols  to  the  language  spoken  by  the  dead  is  largely 
guesswork.  "Every  writer  on  English  verse,"  said  The  Quar- 
terly Review  some  time  since,  "has  his  own  metrical  symbols, 
and  no  one  appears  to  pay  any  attention  to  any  other  theorist, 
except  in  occasional  intervals  for  depreciation."  This  remark 
applies,  in  good  measure,  to  the  phoneticians. 

In  view  of  the  broad  definition  of  rhyme  (see  page  22)  which 
states  the  underlying  purpose  of  the  book,  I  have  not  confined 
myself  to  externals ;  still  less  to  end-rhyme  alone.  The  student 
of  rhyme  must  always  consider  its  ultimate  result  in  the  mind 
as  well  as  its  immediate  effect  upon  the  ear.  Again,  the  book  is 
mainly  a  study  and  record,  not  a  lawgiver.  If  the  history  of 


PREFACE  v 

English  rhyme  teaches  anything,  it  is  that  taste  is  the 
final  arbiter  in  the  matter  of  the  pleasurableness  of  similar 
sounds. 

I  am  of  course  aware  of  the  etymological  reasons  for  the 
spelling  "rime,"  employed  by  eminent  authorities  of  the  present 
day;  as  a  matter  of  fact,  however,  good  use  has*  thus  far 
'refused  to  give  up  the  illogical  "rhyme,"  which  is  therefore 
retained  in  these  pages.  Language,  after  all,  is  a  fact,  not  an 
opinion. 


CHARLES  F.  RICHARDSON. 


DARTMOUTH  COLLEGE, 
June  25,  1909. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

I  THE  POETRY  OF  EARTH 1 

II  THE  RHYTHMICAL  CREATION  OF  BEAUTY    ....  6 

III  ALLITERATION     22 

IV  ASSONANCE 30 

V  END-RHYME 35 

VI  THE  SHAPING  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 85 

VII  THE  ELIZABETHANS  AND  THE  RHYME  CONTROVERSY  108 

VIII  FORMAL  RHYME     146 

IX  ROMANTIC  RHYME     158 

X  MODERN  RHYME 173 

APPENDIX  .  209 


A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 


THE  POETRY  OF  EARTH 

RHYME  is  an  identity  or  close  similarity  between  stressed  sounds 
in  corresponding  places. 

Thus  defined,  rhyme  has  analogies  in  all  the  realm  of  nature. 
Matter  is  a  condition  of  force ;  force  is  motion ;  motion  is  meas- 
ured by  waves ;  and  wave-motion,  whether  of  heat,  light,  sound, 
or  electricity,  is,  like  music  or  verse,  a  series  of  phases  of  stress 
and  interval.  In  a  strictly  physical  sense,  "the  poetry  of  earth 
is  never  dead." 

Emerson  spoke  not  more  as  poet  than  as  observer  when  he 
said: 

"Thou  canst  not  wave  thy  staff  in  air, 

Or  dip  thy  paddle  in  the  lake, 
But  it  carves  the  bow  of  beauty  there, 
And  the  ripples  in  rhymes  the  oar  forsake." 

The  whole  universe  swings  to  rhythm,  and  through  the  ages 
men  have  fancied  themselves  hearing  some  notes  of  the  cosmic 
harmony.  The  Psalmist,  meditating  on  the  heavenly  bodies  by 
night,  perceived  their  "march  of  soundless  music  in  the  vision 
of  the  seer,"  and  exclaimed : 

."The  heavens  declare  the  glory  of  God; 

And  the  firmament  showeth  his  handy-work. 
Day  unto  day  uttereth  speech, 

And  night  unto  night  showeth  knowledge. 
No  speech  nor  language, 

Their  voice  is  not  heard." 

More  confident  was  the  lumberman  in  the  woods  of  northern 
Maine,  who,  when  told  of  the  music  of  the  spheres,  declared  that 

1 


2  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

he  had  often  heard  it,  when  lying  awake  on  winter  nights.     It 
was,  he  said,  "just  like  a  kind  of  little  fine  whizz." 

There  is  more  than  an  elaborate  metaphor  in  the  famous  in- 
troduction to  Dryden's  shorter  Song  for  Saint  Cecilia's  Day.  It 
is  a  fair  summary  of  nineteenth-century  views  of  evolution  and 
the  correlation  and  conservation  of  forces : 

"From  Harmony,  from  heavenly  Harmony 
This  universal  frame  began: 
When  Nature  underneath  a  heap 
Of  jarring  atoms  lay 
And  could  not  heave  her  head, 
The  tuneful  voice  was  heard  from  high, 
Arise,  ye  more  than  dead ! 
Then  cold,  and  hot,  and  moist,  and  dry 
In  order  to  their  stations  leap, 
And  Music's  power  obey. 
From  Harmony,  from  heavenly  Harmony 
This  universal  frame  began : 
From  Harmony  to  Harmony 
Through  all  the  compass  of  the  notes  it  ran, 
The  diapason  closing  full  in  Man."  l 

When  Galileo  and  Bruno  perceived  that  the  solid  earth  itself 
was  but  keeping  time  in  an  orderly  whirl  of  suns  and  stars,  they 
were  not  far  from  the  idea  of  Addison,  who  heard  them  singing  as 
they  shine.  And  thus  Shakespeare  made  Lorenzo  say  to  Jessica : 

"Look  how  the  floor  of  heaven 
Is  thick  inlaid  with  patines  of  bright  gold. 
There 's  not  the  smallest  orb  which  thou  behold'st 
But  in  his  motion  like  an  angel  sings, 
Still  quiring  to  the  young-eyed  cherubins." 

A  hundred  years  before  the  time  of  Dryden  George  Puttenham, 
in  his  Arte  of  English  Poesie  (1589),  reminded  his  readers  that 

1  "Does  not  the  Earth  really  live  a  universal  life?  Are  not  all  its 
parts,  the  liquid  interior  and  the  firm  crust,  the  ocean  and  the  atmo- 
sphere, comprehended  into  a  grand  whole  whose  parts  interact  in 
manifold  ways  and  yet  in  harmony?  Ebb  and  flow,  day  and  night, 
summer  and  winter,  are  they  not  life-rhythms,  similar  to  those  which 
the  individual  life  experiences;  or,  rather,  do  not  animals  and  plants, 
with  their  little  rhythmical  vital  processes,  take  part  in  the  great  life 
of  the  Earth?  Is  not  the  life  of  the  Earth  mirrored  in  their  sleep  and 
waking,  their  bloom  and  withering,  their  origin  and  decay?"  —  Paulsen : 
Introduction  to  Philosophy,  207. 


THE  POETRY  OF  EARTH  3 

doctors  of  theology  said  that  God  made  the  world  by  number, 
measure,  and  weight;  and  that  philosophers  set  forth  a  triple 
proportion,  —  the  arithmetical,  the  geometrical,  and  the  musical. 
Thomas  Campion,  at  the  beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century, 
packed  this  truth  into  a  few  words:  "The  world  is  made  by 
symmetry  and  proportion,  and  is  in  that  respect  compared  to 
music,  and  music  to  poetry." 

Thus,  in  studying  the  unity  of  the  arts,  we  find  one  general  law 
of  harmonious  satisfying  proportion,  so  that  we  speak  of  a  poeti- 
cal picture;  of  tone-color ;  or  find  painting,  song,  orchestration, 
and  the  drama  combining  in  a  Wagnerian  opera.  Perhaps  the 
symphony  is,  as  yet,  man's  highest  contribution  to  pure  art; 
but  there  are  other  symphonies  than  those  of  the  orchestra. 
Every  simplest  consonance  of  sound  is  an  illustration  of  the  pleas- 
ure humanity  has  always  taken  in  that  musical  unity  which  binds 
agreeable  diversities.  It  is  no  wonder,  then,  that  man,  standing 
in  a  universe  of  harmonious  contrasts, 

"Through  worlds,  and  races,  and  terms,  and  times, 
Saw  musical  order  and  pairing  rhymes." 

When  one  hears  the  whisper  of  the  breeze,  the  roar  of  the  sea, 
the  ripple  of  the  brook,  the  trill  of  the  bird,  pleasure  stirs  him  to 
imitation.  The  fable  of  Pan's  flute  was  but  the  anticipation  of 
Beethoven's  Pastoral  Symphony  or  Whitman's  Proud  Music  of 
the  Sea-Storm.1  Thoreau  once  assured  us  that  he  heard  finer 
music  in  the  tinkle  of  his  hoe  on  the  pebbles,  as  he  worked  in  his 
garden  on  the  shore  of  Walden  Pond,  than  in  any  symphony  con- 
cert. To  his  simple  mind  the  telegraph-wire  was  a  "redeemer," 
which  always  brought  him  a  message  from  the  highest:  "As  I 
went  under  the  new  telegraph  wire,  I  heard  it  vibrating  like  a 
harp  high  overhead ;  it  was  as  the  sound  of  a  far-off  glorious  life ; 
a  supernal  life  which  came  down  to  us  and  vibrated  the  lattice 
work  of  this  life  of  ours  —  an  ^Eolian  harp.  It  reminded  me,  I 
say,  with  a  certain  pathetic  moderation,  of  what  finer  and  deeper 
stirrings  I  was  susceptible,  which  grandly  set  all  argument  and 
dispute  aside,  a  triumphant  though  transient  exhibition  of  the 

1  The  original  and  better  title. 


4  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

truth."  Himself  a  flute-player,  he  would  have  been  interested 
in  the  statement  of  a  distinguished  American  organist  who  once 
declared  the  ultimate  sound  of  Niagara,  or  the  roar  of  a  wind- 
swept forest,  or  the  multitudinous  din  of  a  great  city,  to  be  in  the 
key  of  A,  octaves  below  the  bass.  Even  this  rather  surprising 
dictum  is  not  hastily  to  be  dismissed ;  for  many  a  musical  ear,  on 
experiment,  will  determine  that  these  sounds  are  at  least  nearer 
A  than  C  or  E. 

As  regards  language,  with  which  poetry  is  chiefly  concerned, 
Claude  Fauchet,  at  the  close  of  the  sixteenth  century,  said  in  his 
still  serviceable  treatise  on  the  Origines  de  la  Langue  et  Poesie 
Francoise,  Ryme,  et  Romans  (1581) :  "Car  cela  estant  uniuersel 
en  la  nature,  que  tout  mouuement  se  fait  auec  temps,  le  son  & 
les  paroles  estans  mouuements,  ainsi  qu'il  appert  par  leur  origine 
(qui  n'est  autre  chose  qu'un  air  batant  1'artere  par  laquelle  il 
passe,  &  qui  depuis  est  modere*  par  le  palais,  la  langue  &  les 
dents),  il  est  necessaire  que  ce  mouuement  de  paroles  se  face  auec 
le  temps."  And  again:  "Puis  done  (dit  Aristote)  que  le  temps 
est  le  nombre  du  mouuement ;  le  rhythme  (s'il  est  la  mesme  chose 
que  le  temps)  sera  le  mouuement  du  nombre." 

The  historian  Mitford,  in  his  Inquiry  into  the  Principles  of 
Harmony  in  Language  (2d  ed.,  1804),  had  similarly  striven  to 
explain  the  movement  of  verse  by  reference  to  the  laws  of  music. 
Melody,  said  he,  is  a  pleasing  succession  of  varying  tones  exhib- 
ited in  the  flow  of  speech.  There  was  nothing  new,  therefore,  in 
Sidney  Lanier's  detailed  attempt  to  find  the  basis  of  verse  in  the 
laws  of  sound,  and  to  measure  rhythm  by  musical  notation. 
Modern  methods  go  still  farther,  in  making  poetry  visible  as  well 
as  audible;  for  Professor  Scripture's  phonograph  cylinders, 
described  in  his  Experimental  Phonetics,  show  similar  curves 
for  similar  —  that  is,  symmetrically  rhythmical,  or  rhyming  — 
sounds.  Here,  of  course,  are  no  words  or  syllables  —  in  them- 
selves mere  phonetic  devices  —  but  wave-lines  corresponding  to 
vocal  or  other  sounds.1 

Thus  the  poet's  dream  of  harmony  becomes  a  fact  in  the  labora- 

1  "With  the  aid  of  new  and  more  sensitive  methods  of  making  gramo- 
phone and  zonophone  disks,  we  may  hope  to  catch  verse  as  it  flows  from 
the  mouth  of  the  unsuspecting  poet,  and  thus  to  obtain  and  study  some- 


THE  POETRY  OF  EARTH  5 

tory,  where,  not  less  than  in  the  field  or  wood,  there  is  exact 
truth  in  Keats'  statement  that  "the  poetry  of  earth  is  never 
dead." 

thing  far  closer  to  the  real  poem  than  the  cold  and  inadequate  skeleton 
of  it  that  appears  on  the  printed  page."  —  E.  W.  Scripture,  in  The 
Century  Magazine,  February,  1902. 


II 

THE  RYTHMICAL  CREATION  OF  BEAUTY 

WHAT  is  the  relation  between  the  poetry  of  earth  and  the  poetry 
of  man  ? 

Whatever  we  may  dismiss  as  fanciful  or  unproved,  this  at  least 
is  certain :  Nothing  moves  without  vibrations ;  were  the  eye  and 
the  ear  not  reached  by  waves  of  light  and  sound,  nature  and  art, 
as  far  as  man  is  concerned,  would  almost  disappear.  Pulsation, 
impulse  —  the  very  etymology  of  the  words  tells  the  universal 
fact  that  communication  from  man  to  man  is  ever  related  to  the 
rapidity,  force,  regularity,  or  variability  of  vibrations.  The 
more  rhythmical  they  become,  the  more  intense  the  feeling 
aroused. 

Reversing  the  statement,  the  deepest  feeling  instinctively 
adopts  the  rhythmical  form :  the  wail  of  the  animal,  the  lamen- 
tation over  the  corpse,  the  battle-cry,  the  love-song,  the  "Laus 
Deo"  of  noble  triumph.  The  spontaneous  singer  may  burst  into 
recitative,  parallelism,  alliteration,  assonance,  end-rhyme,  or 
what  not ;  but  he  is  sure  to  be  rhythmical,  and  to  stir  his  hearers 
in  proportion  to  the  strength  and  skill  of  his  wave-like  swing 
from  thought  to  thought  and  stress  to  stress. 

"Observe,"  says  Carlyle,  "how  all  passionate  language  does  of 
itself  become  musical,  —  with  a  finer  music  than  the  mere  ac- 
cent ;  the  speech  of  a  man  even  in  zealous  anger  becomes  a  chant, 
a  song.  All  deep  things  are  Song.  It  seems  somehow  the  very 
central  essence  of  us,  Song ;  as  if  all  the  rest  were  but  wrappages 
and  hulls!  The  primal  element  of  us;  of  us,  and  of  all  things. 
The  Greeks  fabled  of  Sphere-Harmonies :  it  was  the  feeling  they 
had  of  the  inner  structure  of  Nature;  that  the  soul  of  all  her 
voices  and  utterances  was  perfect  music.  .  .  .  See  deep  enough, 


and  you  see  musically;  the  heart  of  Nature  being  everywhere 
music,  if  you  can  only  reach  it."  * 

Poe's  definition  of  poetry  as  "the  rhythmical  creation  of 
beauty  "  has  never  been  bettered.  Strictly  considered,  it  in- 
cludes song  and  symphony,  —  vocal  and  instrumental  music  of 
every  kind.  In  the  broad  sense,  music  is  poetry  and  poetry  music. 
If  we  say  that  verse  is  the  rhythmical  creation  of  beauty  in  lan- 
guage, the  statement  is  sufficiently  accurate  for  all  purposes  of 
criticism. 

Whence  comes  the  universal  desire  to  create  the  beautiful  ? 

Many  are  the  theories  of  the  origin  of  art  —  that  is,  of  created 
beauty  —  in  the  world.  Plant-  and  animal-decoration,  for 
allurement  or  defence,  accounts  for  the  subconscious  develop- 
ment of  many  lovely  things,  from  the  petal  of  a  flower  to  the  tail 
of  a  peacock.  Phyllotaxy  and  flower-adornment,  in  the  botanical 
world,  are  both  serviceable  and  symmetrical ;  and  in  the  animal 
kingdom  many  creatures  survive  simply  because  they  appeal,  by 
attractiveness  at  pairing-time,  to  an  unquestionable  sense  of 
beauty  in  their  kind.  From  the  beautiful  in  substance  to  the 
beautiful  in  act  is  but  a  step;  hence  the  gallop,  the  play  of  the 
body,  the  spectacular  flight,  the  bird-song.  Animals  and  chil- 
dren gesture,  intone,  sing;  and  here  the  element  of  feeling,  in- 
dispensable in  the  lyric,  is  added  to  the  satisfaction  inherent  in 
proportion. 

Puttenham  declared  that  "all  arts  grew  first  by  observation  of 
nature's  proceedings  and  custom."  Many  other  theorists  have 
connected  the  beginnings  of  song  with  direct  imitations  of  bird- 
music,  reproduced  by  the  human  voice,  or  by  a  primitive  flute, 
like  Siegfried's.2 

But  the  more  natural  explanation  is  to  be  found  in  the  instinc- 

1  On  Heroes,  Hero-Worship,  and  the  Heroic  in  History,  78. 

2  So  Lucretius  (I,  5, 1378): 

"At  liquidas  avium  voces  imitarier  ore 
Ante  fuit  multo  quam  laevia  carmina  cantu 
Concelebrare  homines  possent,  aureisque  jurare." 

and  compare  the  onomatopoetic  imitations  in  the  Birds  and  Frogs  of 
Aristophanes.  The  "Cuckoo,  jug-jug,  pu-we,  to-witta-woo,"  of  Nash's 
Spring  is  known  to  everybody  from  its  place  on  the  first  page  of  Pal- 
grave's  Golden  Treasury. 


8  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

tive  development  of  the  human  voice  itself,  as  truly  a  musical 
instrument  as  the  skylark's.  In  that  development,  of  course, 
onomatopoeia  and  the  "bow-wow  theory"  explain  many  things. 
The  poetry  of  language  would  be  a  different  thing  without  the 
melodious  I,  the  explosive  p,  the  dull  d,  the  hissing  s,  and  so  on. 
There  was  an  entire  sentence  of  woe  in  the  Anglo-Saxon 
"walawa."  Lord  Bacon  understood  all  this  very  well  when 
he  said,  in  his  Natural  History:  "There  is  found  a  simili- 
tude between  the  sound  that  is  made  by  inanimate  bodies,  or 
by  animate  bodies  that  have  no  voice  articulate,  and  divers 
letters  of  articulate  voices ;  and  commonly  men  have  given  such 
names  to  those  sounds  as  do  allude  unto  the  articulate  letters ;  as 
trembling  of  hot  water  hath  resemblance  unto  the  letter  I; 
quenching  of  hot  metals  with  the  letter  z;  snarling  of  dogs 
with  the  letter  r;  the  noise  of  screech-owls  with  the  letters  sh; 
voice  of  cats  with  the  diphthong  eu;  voice  of  cuckoos  with  the 
diphthong  ou;  sounds  of  strings  with  the  diphthong  ng." 
Long  before  Bacon,  Ovid  had  been  reminded  by  ra  of  the  low- 
ing of  the  ox. 

Birds  and  most  savages  use  a  very  primitive  melody,  chiefly 
relying,  for  effect,  upon  iteration.  Some  Indian-songs  —  and 
Indian  prayers  are  always  lyrical  —  consist  of  only  three  words, 
which  are  sung  over  and  over  again.  At  first,  the  human  song, 
like  that  of  the  bird,  shows  little  emotional  variation ;  stress  of  in- 
tonation and  emphatic  gesture  come  later,  in  the  savage  as  in  the 
child.  When  Darwin  suggested  that  singing  preceded  speech 
and  was  the  author  of  it,  he  simply  sent  us  back  to  the  baby's 
cry  and  coo,  and  to  the  interjection,  which  is  language  before 
it  is  disintegrated  into  words. 

While  the  play-instinct  in  childhood  does  not  account  for  the 
origins  of  art,  it  does  make  plain  the  universality  of  the  art- 
instinct,  and  its  early  appearance  in  the  individual  life.  Aris- 
totle perceived  that  the  two  chief  causes  of  poetry  were  our 
implanted  instincts  of  imitation  and  of  harmonious  rhythm,  by 
which  rude  improvisations  gave  birth  to  true  song.  The  child, 
as  every  one  knows  by  his  own  experience,  is  a  primitive  singer, 
player  upon  musical  instruments,  orator,  dramatist,  painter, 
architect,  soldier,  and  military  and  naval  engineer.  In  his  various 


THE  RHYTHMICAL  CREATION  OF  BEAUTY   9 

doings,  he  instinctively  makes  more  or  less  orderly  repetitions 
of  tone  and  action.  These  repetitions,  while  they  last,  exemplify 
Poe's  dictum  that  unity  and  brevity  are  lyrical  essentials.  Of  the 
truth  of  all  this,  Wordsworth's  famous  lines  in  the  Ode  on  Im- 
mortality are  a  convenient  summary,  showing,  as  they  do,  the 
similarity  between  the  child  and  the  uncivilized  adult : 

."As  if  his  whole  vocation 
Were  endless  imitation." 

But  the  chief  origin  of  art  is  man's  desire  to  perpetuate  the 
fleeting.  That  face  will  disappear  in  death;  I  must  carve  or 
paint  it  while  yet  there  is  time.  My  abode  is  a  poor  perishing 
thing ;  let  me  replace  it  by  wall  and  arch.  That  song  my  fathers 
sang;  I  will  transmit  it,  in  memory  or  manuscript,  to  my  chil- 
dren's children.  My  glorious  reign  will  pass  from  the  minds  of 
men ;  bards  and  scribes  shall  rescue  its  renown  from  the  fugitive 
years.  Of  all  these  things,  litera  scripta  manet;  and  song,  at 
once  agreeable  and  rememberable  because  of  its  rhythm,  has 
best  defied  the  flight  of  the  centuries. 

The  basis  of  song  is  a  yearning  to  transmit  feeling  by  utterances 
at  once  rhythmical  and  cumulative.  In  man,  and  in  many  of  the 
higher  animals,  exists  an  intense  wish  to  express  pleasure  or 
pain,  especially  in  states  of  exaltation.  The  howl  of  the  dog,  the 
purr  of  the  cat,  the  mating-song  of  the  bird,  the  triumphant  crow 
of  the  cock,  the  cheer  of  the  warrior,  the  concerted  grunt  of  the 
laborer,  the  funeral  croon,  are  all  expressions  of  heightened  or 
deepened  feeling,  and  most  of  them  are  more  or  less  modulated. 
Folk-singing,  however  rude,  is  always  rhythmical ;  and  regularity 
increases  with  the  development  of  civilization.  Rhythm,  the 
basis  of  motion  in  the  physical  world,  is  the  foundation  of  primi- 
tive verse,  whether  applied  to  war,  worship,  love,  or  labor.  To 
the  recurrent  sounds  of  the  voice  are  added  simultaneous  recur- 
rent motions  of  the  body,  and  the  emotional  chant,  individual  or 
communal,  is  brought  into  being,  —  a  chant  that  in  its  essen- 
tials contains  the  germs  of  the  dance,  the  drama,  the  opera,  and 
the  balanced  oration.  Probably  there  never  was  a  time,  after  the 
first  steps  in  evolution  had  been  taken,  when  the  lowest  man  — 
some  say  the  woman,  as  having  an  earlier  intellectual  develop- 


10  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

ment  and  a  stronger  emotional  nature,  perhaps  crooning  her 
baby  to  sleep  —  did  not  turn  naturally  to  rhythm  in  some  form, 
afterwards  adding  the  beat  of  vocal  or  instrumental  sound,  or 
both  together,  to  concurrent  and  emphatic  movements  of  the 
body.  Thus  music  became  the  universal  language,  as  marching 
or  dancing  was  almost  the  earliest  of  the  arts. 

"Every  one,"  says  Hazlitt,  "who  declaims  warmly,  or  grows  in- 
tent upon  a  subject,  rises  into  a  sort  of  blank  verse  or  measured 
prose."  Doctor  Johnson  once  summed  the  subject  in  a  few  sonor- 
ous words:  "The  perception  of  harmony  is,  indeed,  conferred 
upon  men  in  degrees  very  unequal ;  but  there  are  none  who  do 
not  perceive  it,  or  to  whom  a  regular  series  of  proportionate 
sounds  cannot  give  delight."  1 

The  deaf,  dumb,  and  blind  Laura  Bridgman  got  some  sense  of 
pleasure  in  the  construction  of  what  seemed  to  her  regularly  re- 
current harmonies  constituting  little  poems  or  hymns;  and  the 
abler  and  more  highly  educated  Helen  Keller  —  profiting  by 
half  a  century  of  development  in  the  education  of  the  deaf  and 
blind  —  apprehended  the  finer  rhythms  of  nature,  and  uttered 
her  feelings  in  language  that  possesses  not  only  the  spirit  but 
something  of  the  form  of  poetry: 

."The  noiseless  little  noises  of  earth 
Come  with  softest  rustle ; 
The  shy,  sweet  feet  of  life ; 
The  silky  flutter  of  moth-wings 
Against  my  restraining  palm ; 
The  strident  beat  of  insect-wings, 
The  silvery  trickle  of  water; 
Little  breezes  busy  in  the  summer  grass ; 
The  music  of  crisp,  whisking,  scurrying  leaves, 
The  swirling,  wind-swept,  frost-tinted  leaves ; 
The  crystal  splash  of  summer  rain, 
Saturate  with  the  odors  of  the  sod.  .  .  . 

f  My  hands  evoke  sight  and  sound  out  of  feeling, 
Intershifting  the  senses  endlessly, 
Linking  motion  with  sight,  odor  with  sound. 
They  give  color  to  the  honeyed  breeze, 
The  measure  and  passion  of  a  symphony 
To  the  beat,  and  quiver  of  unseen  wings. 

1  The  Rambler,  No.  8. 


THE  RHYTHMICAL  CREATION  OF  BEAUTY      11 

In  the  secrets  of  earth  and  sun  and  air 

My  fingers  are  wise ; 

They  snatch  light  out  of  darkness, 

They  thrill  to  harmonies  breathed  in  silence."  l 

The  pleasurably  arranged  sound  of  music  or  verse  exists  in 
some  degree,  of  course,  in  rhythmical  or  balanced  prose,  or  in 
any  utterance  where  idea  is  put  over  against  idea,  or  word  against 
word.  Thought-rhyme  or  thought-rhythm  is  the  setting  of  an 
expression  over  against  its  amplification,  its  duplicate,  or  its 
opposite,  the  two  being  bound  together  in  such  a  way  as  to  pre- 
serve variety  in  unity.  An  ancient  illustration  of  this  regularly 
recurring  balance  of  thought  is  found  in  the  parallelisms  of  the 
Hebrew  Psalms  and  prophetical  books. 

Of  rhyme,  in  the  modern  sense,  Hebrew  literature  had  none, 
though  the  acrostic  abecedarian  arrangement  of  such  composi- 
tions as  Psalm  cxix  is  a  sort  of  alliteration.2  But  in  the  poeti- 

1  The  Century,  May,  1908. 

2  For  the  following  data  with  reference  to  alliteration  and  acrostics  in 
Hebrew  I  am  indebted  to  Lucius  Waterman,  D.  D.,  rector  of  St.  Thomas' 
Church,  Hanover,  N.  H. : 

Alliteration  is  fairly  common  in  Hebrew  of  all  periods.  Examples 
may  be  found  in  Gen.  i,  2;  xviii,  27;  Job  xxx,  19;  xlii,  6;  Is.  xiv,  22; 
xxii,  5;  xxiv,  4;  Ps.  xviii,  8;  Micah  i,  10.  The  Jewish  Encyclopaedia 
says  under  "Alliteration"  that  rhyme  (except  of  inflectional  endings) 
in  Hebrew  is  always  connected  with  assonance  of  the  whole  word. 

Eight  of  the  one  hundred  and  fifty  psalms  ( if  one  takes  Psalms  ix  and 
x  as  one  piece  of  work)  are  marked  by  acrostical  writing.  These  are  ix 
and  x,  xxv,  xxxiv,  xxxvii,  cxi,  cxii,  cxix,  cxlv. 

The  scheme  of  Psalm  ix  is 

Verses  1,  2,  four  strophes,  each  beginning  with  Aleph  [A.  V.  spelling 
of  the  letters]. 

Verses  3,  4,  four  strophes,  the  first  beginning  with  Beth. 

Verse  5,  two  strophes,  the  first  beginning  with  Gimel. 

(Daleth,  the  fourth  letter,  is  wanting.) 

Verse  6,  two  strophes,  the  first  beginning  with  He. 

Verses  7,  8,  9,  10,  eight  strophes,  each  verse  beginning  with  Vau. 

Verses  11,  12,  four  strophes,  the  first  beginning  with  Zain. 

Verses  13,  14,  five  strophes,  the  first  beginning  with  Cheth. 

Verses  15,  16,  five  strophes,  the  first  beginning  with  Teth. 

Verse  17,  two  strophes,  the  first  beginning  with  Jod. 

Verse  18,  two  strophes,  the  first  beginning  with  Caph. 

Two  verses  more  seem  to  be  outside  the  scheme. 

Psalm  x  begins  verse  1  with  the  next  letter,  Lamed,  then  skips  the 
next  six  letters,  but  has  just  such  a  number  of  strophes  as  would  well 
provide  for  six;  then  come 


12  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

cal  books  or  parts  of  books,  such  as  the  Psalms,  Job,  Isaiah,  Joel, 
Ecclesiastes,  the  Song  of  Songs,  the  Proverbs,  etc.,  the  second 
line  or  half-line  is  usually  set  over  against  the  first,  as  its  proper 
balance.  Thus  Hebrew  poetry  combines  a  rhythmical  swing 
with  the  freedom  of  prose.  This  characteristic,  which  was  so 
marked  that  it  remains  in  most  translations,  appears  at  once  in 
what  has  been  called  the  oldest  poem  in  the  world :  the  Lament  of 
Lamech  (Genesis  iv,  23,  24) : 

f'And  Lamech  said  unto  his  wives: 
'Adah  and  Zillah:  hear  my  voice, 
Ye  wives  of  Lamech:  hearken  unto  my  speech; 
For  I  have  slain  a  man  to  my  wounding :  and  a  young  man  to  my  hurt. 
If  Cain  shall  be  avenged  sevenfold:    truly  Lamech  seventy  and 
sevenfold.' " 

More  elaborate  illustrations  of  this  regular  proportional  form 
of  a :  b::c:d  may  be  found  all  through  the  Psalms,  as,  for  in- 
stance, in  Psalm  ciii,  beginning: 

Verses  12,  13,  four  strophes,  the  first  beginning  with  Koph. 

Verse  14,  four  strophes,  the  first  beginning  with  Resh. 

Verses  15,  16,  four  strophes,  the  first  beginning  with  Schin. 

Verses  17,  18,  four  strophes,  the  first  beginning  with  Tau. 

Some  declare  confidently  that  our  present  passage,  verses  2-11  in- 
clusive, is  a  piece  of  another  ancient  poem,  substituted  for  the  original 
of  the  acrostic  writer. 

In  Psalms  xxv  and  xxxiv  there  are  22  verses  each,  but  in  each  case 
only  21  verses  are  acrostical,  the  sixth  letter,  Vau,  being  omitted,  and 
the  22d  verse  beginning  with  a  form  of  the  Hebrew  word  "deliver." 

The  scheme  of  Psalm  xxxvii  is  similar  to  that  of  Psalms  ix-x  (com- 
bined), but  brings  in  the  entire  alphabet,  in  order. 

Psalms  cxi  and  cxii  have  the  same  scheme :  22  strophes,  eight  verses 
of  two  each  being  followed  by  two  verses  of  three  each.  Each  strophe 
begins  with  its  own  letter  of  the  alphabet. 

Psalm  cxix  has  22  sections,  one  for  each  letter  of  the  alphabet.  Each 
section  has  eight  verses  of  two  strophes  each,  and  every  verse  begins 
with  the  letter  of  its  section. 

Psalm  cxlv  has  21  verses,  beginning  with  the  letters  of  the  alphabet 
in  order,  with  the  exception  of  Nun. 

Proverbs  xxxi,  10-31  is  an  acrostic,  the  verses  beginning  with  the  22 
letters  in  order. 

Lamentations  i,  ii,  iii,  and  iv  are  acrostics.  Chapters  ii,  iii,  and  iv 
exchange  the  places  of  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  letters,  Ain  and  Pe. 
Chapter  iii  has  66  verses,  beginning  three  verses  in  succession  with  one 
letter  through  22  triplets. 

Curious  traces  of  an  ancient  acrostic,  which  has  suffered  much  from 
editors,  are  said  by  some  recent  scholars  to  be  found  in  Nahum  i,  3  and 
following  verses. 


THE  RHYTHMICAL.  CREATION  OF  BEAUTY      13 

"  The  Lord  is  full  of  compassion  and  mercy:   long  suffering,  and  of 

great  goodness. 

He  will  not  always  chide ;  neither  keepeth  he  his  anger  forever. 
He  has  not  dealt  with  us  after  our  sins :  nor  rewarded  us  according 

to  our  wickedness. 
For  as  the  heaven  is  high  above  the  earth:  so  far  hath  he  removed 

our  transgressions  from  us." 


Sometimes  the  first  half  of  a  statement  is  elaborated,  but  not 
the  second,  as  in  Psalm  xc,  2 : 

"Before  the  mountains  were  brought  forth, 
Or  ever  thou  hadst  framed  the  earth  and  the  world, 
Even  from  everlasting  to  everlasting,  thou  art  God." 

Again,  the  duplication  is  in  the  second  half,  as  in  verse  4  of 
the  same  Psalm: 

"For  a  thousand  years  in  thy  sight 
Are  but  as  yesterday  when  it  is  past, 
And  as  a  watch  in  the  night." 

Of  this  poetical  element  in  Hebrew  some  of  the  earlier  English 
writers  had  an  inkling.  Said  Thomas  Lodge,  in  his  Defence  of 
Poetry  (1579) :  "Ask  Josephus,  and  he  will  tell  you  that  Isaiah, 
Job,  and  Solomon  vouchsafed  poetical  practices,  for  (if  Origen 
and  he  fault  not)  their  verse  was  hexameter  and  pentameter.  In- 
quire of  Cassiodorus,  he  will  say  that  all  the  beginning  of  poetry 
proceeded  from  the  Scripture."  Similarly  Puttenham:  "King 
David  also  and  Solomon  his  son  and  many  other  of  the  holy 
prophets  wrote  in  metres,  and  used  to  sing  them  to  the  harp,  al- 
though to  many  of  us,  ignorant  of  the  Hebrew  language  and 
phrase,  and  not  observing  it,  the  same  seem  but  a  prose."  Sir 
John  Harrington,  in  1591,  followed  with  the  remark:  "Some 
part  of  the  Scripture  was  written  in  verse,  as  the  Psalms  of  David, 
and  certain  other  songs  of  Deborah,  of  Solomon,  and  others, 
which  the  learnedest  divines  do  affirm  to  be  verse  and  find  that 
they  are  in  metre,  though  the  rule  of  the  Hebrew  verse  they  agree 
not  on."  And  since  nearly  all  writers  on  verse,  for  four  hundred 
years,  have  dutifully  followed  their  predecessors  (when  not  call- 
ing them  too  stupid  for  endurance)  it  was  easy  for  William 


14  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

Vaughan,  in  his  Golden  Grove  (1600),  to  label  Moses  and  Debo- 
rah "the  most  ancient  poets."  1 

The  thought  of  the  Psalms  and  of  King  David  naturally  sug- 
gests the  antiquity  of  the  dance,  and  its  connection  with  lyrical 
and  instrumental  music.2  Some  one  has  said  that  when  Adam 
and  Eve  leaped  their  first  leap  of  joy  and  shouted  their  first  shout 
of  joy  they  gave  the  start  to  the  dance  and  the  duet.  At  any  rate, 
in  the  dawn  of  history  "the  Apollinean  instinct  of  solitary  song 
and  the  Dionysian  impulse  of  ecstatic  communal  emotion"  were 
often  accompanied  by  rhythmical  motions  of  the  body.  At  the 
close  of  a  newly-discovered  fragment  (of  the  fourth  century  B.C.) 
of  Timotheus'  'Ot,  IIep<rai  we  read:  "But  the  Greeks  set  up  a 
trophy,  most  holy  shrine  of  Zeus,  and  aloud  they  shout  the  song 
of  victory  to  Apollo,  their  protecting  god,  and  in  harmony  with 
the  rhythm  beat  the  earth  with  measured  tread."  "The  beat," 
says  the  latest  work  on  musical  notation,3  "is  derived  from  the 
pulse,  and  is  shown  by  raising  and  lowering  the  hand,  —  levatio, 
up-beat ;  positio,  down-beat ;  or  in  Greek,  arsis  and  thesis.  Time 
was  indicated  by  the  raising  and  lowering  of  the  foot  by  the 
Greeks,  hence  the  word  foot  for  a  poetical  measure."  That  is, 
the  foot  is  the  unit  of  time  in  verse,  as  the  measure  is  in  music. 
Later,  in  the  delivery  of  the  Greek  ode,  to  the  accompaniment 
of  music  and  dancing,  the  singers  moved  to  one  side  during  the 

1  A  clean  definition  is  that  given  in  Chaytor's  Companion  to  French 
Verse:  "Poetry  in  its  formal  aspect  may  be  defined,  in  order  to  distin- 
guish it  from  prose,  as  language  in  strictly  recurrent  rhythmical  form. 
.  .  .  By  the  use  of  rhythm  we  mean  the  introduction  into  language  of  a 
principle  of  proportion  in  the  arrangement  of  words.  .  .  .  When  .  .  . 
the  recurrence  of  a  voice-modulation  can  be  anticipated  with  certainty 
by  the  hearer,  rhythm  becomes  metre,  and  such  rhythmical  language 
becomes  verse  or  poetry  (in  form).  Hence  metre  may  be  defined  as 
regularly  recurrent  rhythm."  According  to  this,  the  English  version 
of  the  Psalms,  or  Whitman's  Leaves  of  Grass,  would  not  be  formal 
poetry,  and  would  come  under  the  head  of  rhythm,  not  metre. 

2  "  Dancing,  the  most  real  of  the  arts  (Wagner),  seeing  that  the 
whole  man  is  concerned  in  it,  from  head  to  foot,  with  motions  and 
gestures  that  give  it  tone,  and  rhythm  that  gives  it  speech,  was  also 
the  primitive  and  universal  art,  the  sign  of  social  consent :  consenting 
steps,  with  mimicry  of  whatever  sort,  timed  a  series  of  rude  cries 
which  expressed  the  emotion  of  the  moment,  and  so  grew  into  articu- 
late language."  —  F.  B.  Gummere:  The  Beginnings  of  Poetry,  328. 

8  Notation,  by  C.  F.  Abdy- Williams :  London,  1905. 


THE  RHYTHMICAL  CREATION  OF  BEAUTY      15 

strophe,  and  to  the  other  in  the  antistrophe,  standing  still  in  the 
concluding  epode. 

At  the  basis  of  the  Hebrew  parallelism,  the  Greek  strophe, 
antistrophe,  and  chorus,  and  the  Teutonic  refrain  is,  of  course, 
the  inherent  animal-idea  —  already  mentioned  —  of  strength 
accumulated  by  repetition.1  This  is  notable  in  herdsmen's  calls 
to  animals ;  in  parents'  summons  to  children ;  in  men's  adjura- 
tions to  work,  fight,  or  win  athletic  triumphs ;  in  funeral  croons 
repeatedly  dwelling  on  the  virtues  of  the  dead,  etc.  Such  itera- 
tion goes  from  one  word  to  a  whole  passage.  Similarly,  children 
demand  absolute  uniformity  in  the  oral  telling  of  their  best-loved 
stories,  and  correct  the  narrator  when  he  makes  the  slightest  slip 
from  the  received  version. 

During  the  American  civil  war,  Thomas  Wentworth  Higgin- 
son,  then  colonel  of  a  regiment  of  colored  troops,  largely  com- 
posed of  former  slaves,  gathered  at  first  hand  thirty-six  folk- 
songs, religious,  aspirational,  and  other.2  Most  were  of  unknown 
or  apparently  remote  authorship ;  one  or  two  were  of  recent  and 
known  composition.  Nearly  all  were  influenced  by  scriptural 
thought  or  expression,  but  not  to  the  destruction  of  racial  char- 
acteristics or  proper  originality.  As  a  rule,  the  songs  abounded 
in  the  repetitions,  refrains,  contrasts,  or  parallelisms  which  are 
sure  to  characterize  primitive  verse.  All  were  sung  or  chanted 
by  groups,  rather  than  by  soloists,  and  often  with  a  gusto  amount- 
ing to  frenzy.  Instrumental  accompaniments  were  exceptional. 

A  favorite  device  was  to  add  to  some  general  statement  or 
exclamation  the  names  of  the  individuals  of  the  company,  one 
by  one:  "Hold  your  light,  brudder  Robert,"  etc.,  or 

"Oh,  my  mudder  is  gone !  my  mudder  is  gone  I 
My  mudder  is  gone  into  heaven,  my  Lord  1 " 

followed  by  "my  fader,"  "de  angels,"  and  so  on. 

"The  dusky  figures,"  says  Colonel  Higginson,  "moved  in  the 
rhythmical  barbaric  dance  the  negroes  call  a  shout,  chanting, 

1  The  refrain  is  "the  main  communal  element  in  songs  of  labor;  .  .  . 
its  functions  in  communal  play  [are]  primarily  a  combination  of  con- 
senting cries  and  movements  in  the  festal  dance."  —  F.  B.  Gummere: 
The  Beginnings  of  Poetry,  314. 

1  The  Atlantic  Monthly,  19:  685. 


16  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

often  harshly,  but  always  in  the  most  perfect  time,  some  monot- 
onous refrain."  In  one  song,  looking  toward  freedom,  the  in- 
evitable "no  more"  burden  bears  a  strong  part:  no  more  peck 
o'  corn,  no  more  pint  o'  salt,  no  more  hundred  lash,  no  more 
mistress'  call.  "My  brudder,  how  long"  is  also  a  cry  of  univer- 
sal humanity. 

Some  of  these  "negro  spirituals,"  as  Colonel  Higginson  calls 
them,  have  end-rhyme,  with  the  usual  ballad  indifference  to 
anything  but  rough  assonances ;  but  as  a  rule  the  balanced  ideas, 
in  refrains  or  elsewhere,  furnish  all  the  rhyme-art  deemed 
necessary. 

The  gem  of  this  important  little  ballad-collection  is 

"I  KNOW  MOON-RISE. 

"  I  know  moon-rise,  I  know  star-rise, 

Lay  dis  body  down. 
I  walk  in  de  moonlight,  I  walk  in  de  starlight, 

To  lay  dis  body  down. 
I  '11  walk  in  de  graveyard,  I  '11  walk  through  de  graveyard, 

To  lay  dis  body  down. 
I  '11  lie  in  de  grave  and  stretch  out  my  arms; 

Lay  dis  body  down. 
I  go  to  de  judgment  in  de  evenin'  of  de  day, 

When  I  lay  dis  body  down ; 
And  my  soul  and  your  soul  will  meet  in  de  day 

When  I  lay  dis  body  down." 

In  one  instance  Colonel  Higginson  was  able  to  catch  folk- 
poetry  in  the  making.  He  had  long  wondered  whether  these 
songs  "had  a  conscious  and  definite  origin  in  some  leading  mind, 
or  whether  they  grew  by  gradual  accretion,  in  an  almost  uncon- 
scious way."  At  last,  in  response  to  questioning,  an  oarsman 
confessed:  "I  been  a-raise  a  sing,  myself,  once.  Once  we  boys 
went  for  tote  some  rice,  and  de  nigger-driver,  he  keep  a-callin' 
on  us ;  and  I  say,  '  Oh,  de  ole  nigger-driver ! '  Den  anudder  said, 
'Fust  ting  my  mammy  tole  me  was,  notin'  so  bad  as  nigger- 
driver.'  Den  I  made  a  sing,  just  puttin'  a  word,  and  den  anudder 
word."  Thus,  one  began  the  singing,  and  the  men,  after  listen- 
ing a  moment,  joined  in  the  chorus  as  if  it  were  an  old  acquaint- 
ance, though  they  "evidently  had  never  heard  it  before,  —  with 
the  following  result: 


THE  RHYTHMICAL  CREATION  OF  BEAUTY      17 

"Oh,  de  ole  nigger-driver! 

Oh,  gwine  away  I 
Fust  ting  my  mammy  tell  me, 

Oh,  gwine  away  I 
Tell  me  'bout  de  nigger-driver, 

Oh,  gwine  away ! 
Nigger-driver  second  devil, 

Oh,  gwine  away ! 
Best  ting  for  do  he  driver, 

Oh,  gwine  away ! 
Knock  he  down  and  spoil  he  labor, 

Oh,  gwine  away !  " 

Here,  in  South  Carolina  in  the  'sixties,  was  the  communal 
chant,  developed  on  lines  probably  followed  a  thousand  times 
before,  in  far  antiquity  and  in  many  sundered  lands.1 

As  all  early  songs  were  meant  to  be  heard,  not  read,  any  sort  of 
repetition  helped  the  singer's  memory  and  the  listener's  attention. 

"All  the  moods  of  verse,"  said  Poe,  "rhythm,  metre,  stanza, 
rhyme,  alliteration,  the  refrain,  and  other  analogous  effects  .  .  . 
are  to  be  referred  to  the  human  enjoyment  of  equality,  fitness.'-' 
The  universality  of  the  refrain  satisfied  Poe  of  its  intrinsic  value, 
but  he  undertook  to  improve  it  by  variation,  on  the  ground  that 
"duplicate  sameness  or  monotony"  would  have  been  rejected 
even  in  the  origins  of  rhyme  —  which  it  certainly  was  not.  Of 
the  beautifully  variant  effects  of  Poe's  "repetend"  there  can  be 
no  question ;  but  the  primitive  ear,  like  the  child's,  better  enjoyed 
the  unaltered  "over-and-over-again"  effect,  —  as  even  to-day  we 
enjoy  the  refrains  of  Fine  Flowers  in  the  Valley,  A  Lyke-Wake 
Dirge,  Tennyson's  The  Sisters,  or  Longfellow's  My  Lost  Youth, 
The  effect  of  cumulative  contrast  is  sometimes  best  attained,  as 
in  the  last-named  poem,  by  a  final  utterance  in  prose.  The  pur- 
pose of  the  refrain  is  to  furnish  a  contrast  or  a  climax,  or  both. 
In  such  poems  as  Mrs.  Browning's  The  Rhyme  of  the  Duchess 
May  the  former  is  desired ;  in  Poe's  Raven  both  are  kept  in  mind. 

Thus,  in  all  lands  and  times,  the  rhythmical  creation  of  beauty 
has  proceeded,  by  variant  means,  to  the  arrangement  of  words  in 

1  "Negro  music  is  spontaneous.  In  Africa  it  sprang  into  life  at  the 
war-dance,  at  funerals,  and  at  marriage  festivals.  According  to  African 
students  at  Tuskegee,  there  are  in  the  native  melodies  strains  that  reveal 
the  close  relationship  between  the  negro  music  of  Africa  and  America." 
—  Booker  T.  Washington. 

2 


18  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

such  measured  order  as  shall  give  utterance  to  passion  and  at  the 
same  time  give  pleasure  to  the  ear.  It  must  be  sufficiently  like 
ordinary  prose  to  be  easily  understood,  and  yet  obviously  re- 
moved from  common  speech.  In  a  way,  rhythm  is  added  to 
speech,  in  a  way  it  is  inherent  in  it.  There  is  no  need  to  hunt 
backward,  from  Teuton  to  Roman,  or  Roman  to  Greek,  or 
Greek  to  Arabian  and  Egyptian,  for  the  origins  of  an  instinct 
which  is  universal,  and  is  certain  to  appear  indigenously.  Taci- 
tus says  that  the  Germans  went  to  war  chanting  the  deeds  of 
their  ancestors,  put  into  verse.  The  Anglo-Saxons  rushed  into 
battle,  singing  while  they  smote  with  the  sword  on  the  shield. 
The  sad  processions  of  Russian  exiles  on  their  way  to  Siberia  have 
timed  their  monotonous  songs  to  the  clanking  of  their  chains. 

In  all  these  different  but  similar  creations,  the  ear  is  the  law- 
giver. Bede,  our  first  English  writer  on  versification,  saw  that 
the  difference  between  metre  and  rhythm  is  that  the  latter  is  a 
free  chant,  not  subject  to  any  strict  law.1  Before  him,  St.  Augus- 
tine had  said  that  all  metre  is  rhythm,  but  all  rhythm  not  metre. 
Rhythm  is  merely  a  somewhat  regular  arrangement  of  time-inter- 
vals. In  it,  as  in  verse,  the  syllable  is  by  no  means  the  metrical  unit. 

Balanced  prose,  the  oratorical  swing,  the  strong  iteration,  the 
effective  contrast,  have  always  been  recognized  by  all  writers  on 
oratory,  from  Aristotle,  Cicero,  and  Quintilian  down;  and  all 
have  argued  that  they  must  never  become  regular  verse.  Thus 
there  may  be  rhythmical  prose,  but  never  metrical  prose.  But 
the  best  Greek  and  Roman  rhetoricians  all  understood  and  em- 
phasized the  fact  that  "the  harmony  of  language,  even  of  prose, 
belongs  to  the  science  of  music." 

It  is  no  wonder  that  writers  as  late  as  William  Webbe  (1586) 
believed  in  the  old  fable  that  Orpheus  "by  the  sweet  gift  of  his 
heavenly  poetry  withdrew  men  from  ranging  uncertainly  and 
wandering  brutishly  about" ;  or  that  he  reverently  cited  Plato  in 
support  of  the  theory  that  the  first  singers  were  called  Votes  be- 
cause "inspired  with  some  divine  instinct  from  heaven,"  while 
the  rest,  "which  sang  of  love  matters,  or  other  lighter  devices  al- 
luring unto  pleasure  or  delight,  were  called  Poetae  or  makers. 
Thus  it  appeareth  both  eloquence  and  poetry  to  have  their  be- 
1  See  page  46. 


THE  RHYTHMICAL  CREATION  OF  BEAUTY      19 

ginning  and  original  from  these  exercises,  being  framed  in  such 
sweet  measure  of  sentences  and  pleasant  harmony  called  'PvO/Aos, 
which  is  an  apt  composition  of  words  or  clauses,  drawing  as  it 
were  by  force  the  hearer's  ears  even  whithersoever  it  listeth,  that 
Plato  affirmeth  therein  to  be  contained  yorjrela,  an  enchantment, 
as  it  were  to  persuade  them  anything  whether  they  would  or  no."  * 
It  is  a  far  cry  from  Plato  to  de  Banville;  but  they  agreed  in 
making  the  Over-Soul  the  real  poet,  the  earthly  singer  being  but 
the  mouthpiece.  Said  Plato:  "Had  he  [the  poet]  learned  by 
rules  of  art,  he  would  have  known  how  to  speak,  not  of  one  theme 
only,  but  of  all;  and,  therefore,  God  takes  away  the  mind  of 
poets,  and  uses  them  as  His  ministers,  as  He  also  uses  diviners 
and  holy  prophets,  in  order  that  we  who  hear  them  may  know 
that  they  speak  not  of  themselves,  who  utter  these  priceless  words 
in  a  state  of  unconsciousness,  but  that  God  is  the  speaker,  and 
that  through  them  He  is  conversing  with  us."  2  Similarly  de 
Banville,  who  declares  that  rhyme  is  the  quality  that  constitutes 
the  poet;  his  is  "ce  mot  sorcier,  ce  mot  fee,  ce  mot  magique" : 
"Si  vous  e"tes  poete,  vous  commencerez  par  voir  distinctement 
dans  la  chambre  noir  de  votre  cerveau  tout  ce  que  vous  voulez 
montrer  a  votre  auditeur,  et  en  meme  temps  que  les  visions,  se 
pre"senteront  spontanement  a  votre  esprit  les  mots  qui,  place's  a  la 
fin  des  vers,  auront  le  don  d'eVoquer  ces  me'mes  visions  pour  vos 
auditeurs.  Le  reste  ne  sera  plus  qu'un  travail  de  gout  et  de  co- 
ordination, un  travail  d'art  qui  s'apprend  par  I'Stude  des  maitres 
et  par  la  fre"quentation  assidue  de  les  oeuvres.  Si  au  contraire 
vous  n'e"tes  pas  poete,  vous  n'aurez  que  des  visions  confuses,  que 
nul  peintre  ne  pourrait,  d'apr£s  votre  re*cit,  traduire  d'une  man- 
i£re  claire  et  intelligible;  et  les  mots  qui  pourront  susciter  ces 
me'mes  visions  dans  1'esprit  de  votre  auditeur  ne  vous  viendront 
pas  a  la  pense"e.  Car  ce  n'est  ni  le  bon  sens,  ni  la  logique,  ni 
1' erudition,  ni  la  me"moire,  qui  fournissent  ces  mots  arme's  d'un 
si  Strange  pouvoir ;  ils  ne  se  pre"sentent  a  la  pense"e  qu'en  vertu 
d'un  don  special,  qui  ne  s'acquiert  pas."  3 

1  A  Discourse  of  English  Poetry;   reprinted  in  Elizabethan  Literary 
Criticism,  ed.  by  G.  Gregory  Smith,  I,  231. 

2  Dialogues:  Ion  (translated  by  Jowett). 

3  Petit  Traite  de  Poesie  Francaise,  50. 


20  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

In  the  rhythmical  creation  of  beauty,  the  unity  of  the  arts 
must  never  be  forgotten.  But  that  unity  does  not  mean  that  they 
are  equivalent  or  interchangeable.  Instrumental  music  is  not 
vocal  music,  nor  is  sung  poetry  exactly  equivalent  to  recited 
poetry.  George  Saintsbury  concludes  that  "one  has,  while  ad- 
mitting the  great  stimulating  force  of  music,  to  hint  or  re-hint  a 
doubt  whether,  by  itself,  it  can  do  much  for  prosody  save  sug- 
gest." But  such  suggestion  may  be  very  strong:  Stephen  C. 
Foster,  the  most  original  American  composer,  wrote  the 
words  and  music  of  his  songs  simultaneously,  fitting  the  one 
to  the  other  as  he  went  along.  The  French  critic  Camille 
Mauclair  finds  in  Schumann  the  union  of  song  and  syllabic 
sonority. 

Many  later  critics  agree  with  Sir  Philip  Sidney  in  his  explicit 
characterization  of  music  as  "the  most  divine  striker  of  the 
senses."  Poe,  certainly  most  competent  to  speak,  declared 
verse  "an  inferior  and  less  capable  music."  Poe,  indeed,  in- 
cluded the  landscape  garden  with  painting,  sculpture,  architec- 
ture, the  dance,  and  music,  as  expressive  of  the  poetic 
sentiment. 

In  this  fascinating  "land  east  of  the  sun  and  west  of  the  moon," 
where  one  may  hear  colors,  and  see  perfumes,  and  try  to  incarnate 
in  this  or  that  art  what  all  feel  but  never  see,  modern  symbolism 
has  found  its  veritable  home.  Hence  "tone-pictures";  poems 
translated  into  symphonies;  and  impressionistic  fantasias  of 
every  kind. 

Pater  was  right  when  he  reminded  us  that  in  the  unity  of  the 
arts,  as  elsewhere,  the  rule  of  suum  cuique  holds.  "  It  is  a  common 
and  fundamental  error  to  suppose  that  all  of  them  draw  on  a 
single  fixed  quantity  of  imaginative  thought,  whereas  actually 
each  has  its  own  special  quality  of  beauty,  untranslatable  into 
the  terms  of  any  other.  All  art  aspires  towards  the  condition  of 
music  —  towards  that  perfect  fusion  of  matter  and  expression 
that  music  at  its  highest  exhibits.  It  follows,  then,  that  the  finer 
the  poem  the  more  completely  self  sufficing  is  it." 

It  is  the  function  of  poetry  to  excite  or  elevate  the  soul.  Hence 
he  who  sings  sweetly  must  first  have  seen  or  felt  sincerely.  The 
truest  inspiration  instinctively  turns  to  the  best  rhythms  and  the 


THE  RHYTHMICAL  CREATION  OF  BEAUTY     21 

fittest  rhymes.  These  rhythms  and  rhymes  stir  corresponding 
vibrations  in  the  mind  of  the  hearer  or  reader,  as  the  sounded 
violin-string  sets  a-throbbing  its  fellow-string  in  the  piano. 
Rhythmical  beauty  has  not  reached  its  full  creation  until  it  is 
transmitted. 


Ill 

ALLITERATION 

IF  our  definition  of  rhyme  —  the  identity  or  close  similarity  of 
stressed  sounds  in  corresponding  places  —  is  proper,  it  follows 
that  alliteration,  which  is  nothing  if  not  this,  is  as  truly  rhyme  as 
is  end-rhyme.  One  occurs  at  the  beginning  of  a  sound-group, 
the  other  at  the  end,  that  is  all. 

We  may  generalize  thus : 

Rhyme  =  identity,  or  close  similarity,  between  stressed 
sounds  in  corresponding  places. 

Beginning-rhyme  =  alliteration;  initial-rhyme. 

Middle-rhyme  =  assonance:  identity  or  similarity  of  in- 
cluded vowel-sounds.  Spanish  assonance  also  requires  the  same 
vowel-sounds,  in  order,  from  the  last  accented  vowel  to  the  end 
of  the  word. 

End-rhyme  =  identity  or  similarity  of  final  stressed  vowels 
and  any  following  consonants;  preceding  consonants  being 
different. 

Schipper,  in  his  treatise  on  Englische  Metrik  (I,  31),  says: 
"  Die  Alliteration,  auch  Anreim,  oder  haufiger  Stabreim  genannt, 
ist  die  specifisch  altgermanische  Reimart  und  zugleich  die 
alteste  in  der  Poesie  der  germanischen  Vb'lker." 

Gummere  and  the  best  of  the  authorities  since  Schipper  agree 
with  him  —  and  with  common  sense  —  in  considering  allitera- 
tion, assonance,  and  end-rhyme  as  different  expressions  of  the 
same  thing.  One  of  them  has  been  characteristic  of  one  lan- 
guage or  time,  another  of  another,  that  is  all.  This  is  concisely 
put  by  F.  A.  March  (Latin  Hymns,  320) : 

"Nations  who  unite  prose  accent  and  arsis  need  to  mark  off 
their  verses  plainly.  They  do  it  by  rhyme,  the  rhythmical  repe- 


ALLITERATION  23 

tition  of  letters.  When  the  rhyming  letters  begin  their  words,  it 
is  called  alliteration;  when  they  end  their  words,  it  is  called 
rhyme.  Rhyme  seems  to  have  grown  naturally  into  use  in  the 
later  Latin  poetry.  It  will  be  seen  to  appear  first  as  an  occa- 
sional ornament  in  the  hymns,  and  become  regular  in  form  and 
place  by  slow  degrees.  The  old  Teutonic  poetry  used  allitera- 
tion as  an  essential  part  of  their  metrical  system,  and  German 
and  Anglo-Saxon  poets  often  use  it  freely  in  their  Latin  verses." 
Professor  March  elsewhere  says  that  alliteration  was  essential, 
and  other  rhyme  ornamental,  in  Anglo-Saxon,  Icelandic,  and 
Old  Saxon. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  hunt  for  earlier  uses  of  alliteration,  in 
classical  or  other  tongues.  In  the  old  Latin  line,  "O  Tite  tute 
Tati  tibi  tanta  tyranne  tulisti,"  it  extends  to  the  unusual  number 
of  seven  letters,  but  such  things  are  mere  sporadic  "sports." 

Alliteration  lent  itself  easily  to  the  needs  of  a  folk  that  enjoyed 
"both  singing  and  striking  in  front  of  the  war."  The  Shaper  in 
the  mead-hall  struck  the  harp  and  sang  "with  gesture,  with  the 
beat  of  his  voice  and  of  the  hand  upon  his  instrument  at  each 
alliterative  word  of  the  saga."  1  The  use  of  alliteration  "served 
to  indicate  at  once  the  place  of  the  rhetorical  emphasis  and  of  the 
rhythmical  pause."  Hence  the  minstrel's  "natural  tendency  was 
to  conduct  his  narrative  through  a  series  of  abrupt,  energetic 
clauses,  packed  with  those  phrases,  in  immediate  apposition  with 
each  other,  so  frequent  in  Hebrew  poetry,  and  technically  called 
parallelisms;  the  whole  effect  being  well  suited  to  chanting  or 
recitative."  2 

Anglo-Saxon  alliteration,  according  to  John  Earle,  "gratified 
the  ear  with  a  resonance  like  that  of  modern  rhyme,  but  it  also 
had  the  rhetorical  advantage  of  touching  the  accented  or  em- 
phatic words;  falling  as  it  did  on  the  natural  summits  of  the 
construction,  and  tinging  them  with  the  brilliance  of  a  musical 
reverberation."  The  same  Anglo-Saxon  scholar  deems  allitera- 
tion superior,  in  the  strength  of  its  effects,  to  end-rhyme  itself: 

"Rhyme  [end-rhyme]  is  an  attendant  upon  metre;  its  office  is 
to  mark  the  'verse'  or  turn  of  the  metre,  where  it  begins  again. 

1  S.  A.  Brooke :  History  of  Early  English  Literature. 

2  W.  J.  Courthope :  History  of  English  Poetry. 


24  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

Rhyme  is  an  insignificant  thing  in  itself,  as  compared  with  allit- 
eration; whereas  this  is  ...  an  accentual  reverberation,  and 
rests  upon  the  most  vital  part  of  words,  rhyme  is  but  a  syllabic 
resonance,  and  rests  most  frequently  upon  syllables  which  are  of 
secondary  consideration." 

Alliteration  doubtless  arose  spontaneously  among  the  Ger- 
manic peoples  as  a  result  of  their  enjoyment  of  similar  stresses, 
in  languages  lacking  any  finer  undertones  of  phonetic  effect. 

Anglo-Saxon  (Old  English)  verse,  like  Scandinavian  and  Old 
German,  was  rhythmical  and  alliterative.  In  Anglo-Saxon 
poetry  each  line  was  in  two  halves,  divided  by  a  pause  at  the  end 
of  a  word.  The  first  root-syllables  of  words  were  stressed,  there 
being  at  least  one  such  stress  in  each  half-line.  The  alliterative 
consonants  were  the  same;  the  alliterative  vowels  were  usually 
different,  it  being  considered  that  all  vowels  were  so  similar  in 
sound  as  to  be  alliterative.  When  unstressed  syllables  were  allit- 
erative, the  circumstance  was  an  accident,  to  be  disregarded  in  the 
rhyme-scheme.1 

None  of  the  Teutonic  lands  —  Germany,  Iceland,  Denmark, 
Norway,  or  Sweden  —  led  England  in  the  use  of  this  poetical 
means  of  effect,  which  is  almost  instinctive  in  the  folk-poetry  of 
every  age.  And  from  Chaucer  to  Swinburne  it  has  been  much 
more  than  an  ornament.  However  Chaucer  or  we  may  disclaim 
"rym  ram  ruff,"  it  is  bound  to  reappear  in  pun  or  proverb,  in 
lyric  and  blank-verse  epic. 

1  Or  to  restate  this  in  the  clear  words  of  Henry  Sweet  (Anglo-Saxon 
Reader,  7th  ed.) : 

"Old  English  poetry  consists  of  lines  (long  verses)  divided  into 
verses  (short  verses,  half  verses)  by  a  pause  or  caesura,  the  two  verses 
being  bound  together  by  alliteration.  .  .  .  There  is  also  a  tendency  to 
parallelism,  or  repetition  of  the  same  idea  in  different  words.  The  last 
half  of  one  line  is  often  connected  with  the  first  half  of  the  next,  in  this 
way: 

"  '  Unriht  sefnde,  op  pset  ende  becwom 
swylt  aefter  synnum.  pset  gesyne  wearp 
widcup  werum,  psette  wrecend  pa  gyt 
lifde  sefter  lapum.' " 

["  111  deeds  performing,  till  his  end  overtook  him, 
Death  for  his  sins.    JT  was  seen  very  clearly, 
Known  unto  earth-folk,  that  still  an  avenger 
Outlived  the  loathed  one."  —  Hall's  Beowulf.] 


ALLITERATION  25 

The  history  of  alliteration  in  English,  and  of  its  relation  to  end- 
rhyme,  belongs  to  all  the  later  chapters  of  this  book,  and  espe- 
cially to  that  devoted  to  The  Shaping  of  English  Verse.  Some 
of  its  collateral  appearances  may  be  noted  here,  as  throwing  light 
on  English  use. 

Early  German  poetry  was  scantier  than  Anglo-Saxon  or  Scan- 
dinavian. Though  Otfried  used  end-rhyme  as  far  back  as  the 
ninth  century,  alliteration  was  in  Germany,  as  elsewhere,  the 
Teutonic  mark.  German  alliterative  verse  was  somewhat  more 
irregular  than  Anglo-Saxon,  and  included  more  syllables  in  the 
line.  "We  know,  or  may  at  least  infer,"  says  Kuno  Francke, 
"that  the  form  of  all  of  these  [first  German]  poems  once  in  ex- 
istence was  the  same  as  that  of  the  few  preserved  to  us :  namely, 
the  rhymeless,  alliterative  verse,  consisting  of  two  half-lines, 
separated  by  a  caesura,  —  a  metre  whose  grand,  sonorous  mo- 
notony was  wonderfully  adapted  to  the  representation  of  a  life  of 
primitive  heroism."  1  No  existing  poem,  however,  in  length  or 
merit,  shows  this  power  in  any  such  degree  as  the  Anglo-Saxon 
Beowulf.  The  German  Wessabrun  Prayer  (about  800)  "de- 
scribes the  created  world,"  says  Francke,  "in  a  manner  remark- 
ably similar  to  the  cosmogony  of  the  Elder  Edda."  Its  allitera- 
tion is  usually  obvious,  but  the  text  is  not  sufficiently  certain  to 
enable  the  student  to  draw  exact  conclusions  as  to  the  scheme  as 
it  lay  in  the  poet's  mind.  In  the  somewhat  later  Old  High  Ger- 
man fragment  of  the  Hildebrandslied,  however,  though  in  some 
cases  the  singer  was  satisfied  with  one  alliteration  in  the  first  half- 
line  and  one  in  the  second,  in  most  instances  he  used  two  in  the 
first  and  one  in  the  second,  in  the  manner  so  familiar  to  readers 
of  our  own  Beowulf.  Essentially  the  same  is  the  alliterative 
rhyme  of  the  Old  Saxon  Heliand  (ninth  century).2 

It  should  be  said,  in  passing,  that  German  mono-rhyme  is  but 
a  later  form  of  alliteration ;  for  example,  in  one  of  Walther  von 
der  Wogelweide's  Lieder  (about  1200)  the  successive  stanzas  are 
mono-rhymed  —  aeiou  —  after  this  pattern,  reminding  us  of 
the  similiter  desinens  of  late  Latin: 

1  History  of  German  Literature. 

2  For  a  sufficiently  full  discussion  of  this  subject,  with  numerous 
examples,  see  F.  Kauffmann's  Deutsche  Metrik;  Marburg,  1897.    Some- 
times the  alliterative  rhyme-scheme  was  abab,  sometimes  aaaa. 


26  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

"Diu  werlt  was  gelf,  rot  unde  bla, 
griien,  in  dem  walde  und  anderswa 
kleine  vogele  sungen  da. 
nti  schriet  aber  den  nebelkra. 
pfligt  s'iht  ande  varwe?  ja, 
s'ist  worden  bleich  und  iibergra : 
des  rimpfet  sich  vil  manic  bra." 

The  following  data  concerning  Icelandic  alliteration  I  condense 
from  various  parts  of  Vigfusson  and  Powell's  Corpus  Poeticum 
Boreale.1 

In  every  line  of  old  Northern  poetry  the  verse  was  divided  into 
halves  by  a  line-pause  at  the  end  of  a  word.  Each  half  was 
made  up  of  a  fixed  number  of  measures,  that  is,  word  or  number 
of  words,  of  which  the  first  syllable  was  forcibly  pronounced. 
The  measure  never  began  or  ended  in  the  middle  of  a  word.  In 
each  line  at  least  two  stressed  syllables  must  begin  with  similar 
consonants  or  with  vowels;  the  vowels  were  usually  different, 
and  in  later  Northern  poetry  always  so.  There  was  no  strict  num- 
ber of  syllables  in  the  half-lines.  In  the  beginning,  poetry  was 
merely  excited  or  emphatic  prose,  with  repetitions  and  catch- 
words.2 

Alliteration,  in  the  Scandinavian  tongues,  followed  natural 
laws ;  serving  something  the  same  purpose  as  quantity  in  Greek. 
At  first  there  was  probably  no  accompaniment  by  musical  instru- 
ments, and  the  verse  had  to  carry  itself;  in  the  old  epic  metre 
alliteration  was  the  only  bond.  In  a  rougher  way,  the  old  Teu- 
tonic laws,  dicta,  etc.,  though  not  strictly  in  verse,  had  line-pause, 
stress,  and  alliteration,  the  last  of  which  was  designed  to  aid  the 
memory.  In  poetic  alliteration  words  were  often  forced  beyond 
agreeableness  or  intelligibility,  for  the  sake  of  the  beginning- 
rhyme.  Descriptive  synonyms  were  used  (as  in  Anglo-Saxon) ; 
thus  the  hero  was  the  spear-hurler,  the  wolf-feeder,  the  steersman, 
the  ring-giver. 

"It  is  impossible  to  satisfy  the  popular  ear  in  Iceland  without 
alliteration,  even  to  this  day.  The  editor  [Gudbrand  Vigfusson] 

1  Corpus  Poeticum  Boreale :  the  Poetry  of  the  Old  Northern  Tongues, 
from  the  Earliest  Times  to  the  Thirteenth  Century.  Edited,  etc.,  by 
Gudbrand  Vigfusson  and  F.  York  Powell.  2  vols.,  Oxford,  1883. 

a  See  the  preceding  chapter  on  The  Rhythmical  Creation  of  Beauty. 


ALLITERATION  27 

remembers  many  instances  of  this  from  his  childhood.  In  Ice- 
landic of  the  present  day  alliteration  of  stressed  words  is  a  sine 
qua  non  in  all  verse,  rhymed  or  unrhymed." 

In  the  following  lines,  selected  as  representative,  the  allitera- 
tive effect  is  sufficiently  apparent  even  to  those  unacquainted 
with  the  language.  It  is  from  the  Raven-Song  of  the  poet  Horn- 
klofi  (about  985) : 

5"Hvat  es  ydr,  hrafnar?    Hva'San  eroS  e"r  komnir 
meS  dreyrgo  nefi  at  digi  aondverSom? 
hold  lo'Sir  ySr  f  klom ;  hrses  pefr  gengr  ySr  or  munni ; 
nser  hykk  y5r  f  n6tt  bioggo  £>ar[s]  6r  vissoft  nai  liggja.' 

'"How  is  it  with  you,  ye  ravens?  Whence  are  ye  come  with  gory 
beak  at  the  dawning  of  the  day  ?  There  is  flesh  cleaving  to  your  talons, 
and  a  scent  of  carrion  comes  from  your  mouth.  Ye  lodged  last  night, 
I  ween,  near  where  ye  knew  the  corses  were  lying.'"  (Vigfusson's 
translation.) l 

The  earliest  manuscript  of  any  Icelandic  poem  is  of  the  thir- 
teenth century;  none  is  thought  to  have  been  composed  earlier 
than  the  ninth. 

Icelandic  alliteration  is  more  melodious,  on  the  whole,  than 
Anglo-Saxon.  The  songs  generally  consist  of  eight  verses  or 
lines,  four  so  united  that  each  half  of  the  strophe  has  an  independ- 
ent thought.  Each  half  is  again  divided  into  two  parts,  which 
form  a  fourth  part  of  the  whole  strophe,  and  contain  two  lines 
belonging  together  and  united  by  alliteration.  There  are  (usu- 
ally) two  alliterations  in  the  first  line  and  one  at  the  beginning  of 
the  second  line.  The  third  and  last  letter  is  called  the  head- 
stave,  as  ruling  over  the  two  others,  called  supporters.  There 
are  two  feet  or  accents  in  each  of  the  eight  verses.  Sometimes 
there  is  a  strophe  of  six  lines,  the  third  and  sixth  alliterating  inde- 
pendently, and  the  first,  second,  fourth,  and  fifth  together.  In 
the  use  of  the  scalds  there  was  greater  variety,  and  longer  verses. 
The  most  common  metre  had  three  feet  in  each  of  eight  lines. 

John  Earle  thinks  that  alliteration  might  have  been  devel- 
oped in  England  as  in  Iceland,  had  it  been  isolated  from  Roman- 
esque literature.  It  retired  into  the  background  after  England 
came  under  French  influence.  It  was,  again,  for  a  short 

1  Corpus  Poeticum  Boreale,  I,  256. 


28  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

time,  a  nearly  equal  rival  of  the  iambic  rhymed  couplet  in  the 
fourteenth  century,  but  thenceforward  declined,  and  had  become 
a  "whimsical  curiosity"  in  Shakespeare's  time.  "I  will  some- 
thing affect  the  letter,  for  it  argues  facility,"  says  Holofernes  (in 
Love's  Labor 's  Lost,  IV,  2). 

"The  various  kinds  of  by-play  in  poetry,  such  as  alliteration, 
rhyme,  and  assonance,  seem  all  to  harmonize  with  the  accentua- 
tion. Alliteration  belongs  naturally  to  a  language  which  tends  to 
throw  its  accent  as  far  back  as  possible  toward  the  beginning  of  a 
word ;  rhyme  and  assonance  suit  those  which  lean  towards  a  ter- 
minal accentuation.  Hence  alliteration  is  the  domestic  artifice  of 
Teutonic  poetry,  as  rhyme  and  assonance  are  of  the  Roman- 
esque. Rhyme  has  indeed  won  its  way,  as  in  nearly  all  our  other 
dialects;  still  it  is  in  Romance  literature  that  we  must  observe 
it,  if  we  would  see  it  in  the  full  swing  which  it  enjoys  only  in  its 
native  element." 

The  north  and  west  of  England,  as  we  shall  see  in  the  chapter 
on  The  Shaping  of  English  Verse,  used  alliteration,  more  or  less, 
to  the  end  of  the  fifteenth  century;  indeed,  as  has  been  said,  it 
has  never  been  lost  to  the  English  ear.  Modern  European  litera- 
tures generally  gave  up  alliterative  beginning-rhyme  in  connection 
with  neo-Latin  influences.  Abused,  it  became  a  mere  tiresome 
trick,  as  in  Hugobald  the  Monk's  alleged  "large  poem  to  the 
honor  of  Carolus  Calvus,"  mentioned  by  Puttenham,  in  which 
every  word  began  with  c,  thus :  "Carmina  clarisonae  Calvis  can- 
tate  camenae,"  etc.  Such  stuff  is  on  the  level  of  "An  Austrian 
army,  awfully  arrayed,"  of  our  childhood.  By  Puttenham's 
time  this  business  had  come  to  seem  "but  a  fantastical  devise, 
and  to  no  purpose  at  all  more  than  to  make  them  harmonical  to 
the  rude  ears  of  those  barbarous  ages." 

Thus  alliteration  in  English  verse,  since  the  days  of  Surrey, 
has  remained  a  matter  of  embellishment  rather  than  of  necessity. 
It  has  chiefly  appeared  in  connection  with  end-rhyme,  and  not 
as  a  substitute  for  it.  Without  alliteration,  English  poetry  would 
have  lost  much  even  in  blank  verse ;  and  such  new  tunes  as  have 
been  played  upon  the  old  lyre  by  Poe  and  Swinburne  have  often 
been  alliterative.  Poe  thought  that  alliteration  could  be  "made 
to  infringe  on  the  province  of  rhyme  by  the  introduction  of  general 


ALLITERATION  29 

similarities  of  sound  between  whole  feet  occurring  in  the  body  of  a 
line."  He  also  perceived  that  the  refrain  was  a  kind  of  rhyme,  al- 
literative or  other. 

To  some  ears,  however,  alliteration  is  an  intrusive  discordance. 
"As  soon,"  says  Tom  Hood  the  younger  (in  The  Rhymester),  "as 
alliteration  attracts  the  reader's  attention  as  a  tour  de  force  it  is 
a  blot  .  .  .  machinery  instead  of  matter."  The  same  rhymer 
thinks  that  the  chief  drawback  of  English  as  a  poetical  language 
is  the  preponderance  of  consonants ;  while,  on  the  contrary,  an- 
other critic  assures  us  that  likeness  of  neighboring  consonant 
sounds,  if  not  too  frequent,  is  an  element  of  beauty.  Who  shall 
decide  ? 

Meanwhile,  the  general  public  holds  to  alliteration  in  many  a 
pun  or  proverb,  book-title,  or  newspaper  head-line.  One  hears 
daily  such  expressions  as  "neither  chick  nor  child";  "without 
fear  or  favor";  "to  have  and  to  hold";  "house  and  home"; 
"kith  and  kin" ;  "neither  rhyme  nor  reason" ;  "safe  and  sound" ; 
"time  and  tide";  "watch  and  ward";  "wind  and  weather"; 
"wit  and  wisdom,"  etc.  There  is  also  a  survival  of  pleasure,  a 
thousand  years  after  the  Anglo-Saxon  time,  in  any  mere  vowel 
alliteration,  such  as  "end  and  aim";  "ever  and  aye,"  etc. 

"How  dear  to  humanity,"  says  John  Earle,  "is  the  very  jingle 
of  his  speech ;  and  how  he  loves,  even  in  his  riper  age,  to  keep  up 
a  phantom  of  that  harmony  which  in  his  infancy  blended  sound 
and  sense  in  one  indistinguishable  chime!" 


IV 

ASSONANCE 

ASSONANCE,  to  the  English  ear,  is  but  half-rhyme,  and  is  likely 
to  be  either  imperceptible  or  intrusive.  Notwithstanding  its 
effective  use  by  a  few  of  our  poets,  it  plays  so  small  a  part  in 
English  verse  that  any  discussion  of  it  must  be  brief. 

To  some  extent  assonance  is  common  to  all  languages,  and  is 
bound  to  appear  accidentally.  When  it  is  used  consciously,  as  a 
means  of  increasing  the  hearer's  poetic  pleasure,  it  becomes  a 
rhyme-art. 

"Vowel-rhyme"  is  a  better  synonym  for  assonance  than 
"middle-rhyme,"  for  the  latter  term  is  sometimes  applied  to  "in- 
ternal rhyme,"  i.  e.,  a  syllabic  group  in  the  middle  of  a  line 
rhyming  with  one  at  the  end.  Assonance  was  common  to  all 
early  Romance  tongues,  and,  in  particular,  is  a  distinguishing 
mark  of  Spanish.  To  some  extent  it  took  the  place,  in  Romance 
poetry,  of  alliteration  in  Teutonic.  In  general,  it  differed  from 
Teutonic  vowel-correspondence  in  that  corresponding  rhyming 
vowels  were  usually  both  preceded  and  followed  by  consonants,  — 
as  in  the  English  height:  shine. 

An  interesting  specimen  of  twelfth  century  Latin  assonance  is 
cited  by  D.  Marcelino  Mene'ndez  y  Pelayo  in  Vol.  XI  of  the  An- 
tologia  de  Poetas  Liricos  Castellanos  (Madrid,  1903).  It  was,  he 
says,  first  noted  in  1827  by  the  "ilustre  humanista  hispano-ameri- 
cano  D.  Andres  Bello,"  who  found  it  in  a  Vida  de  la  Condesa 
Matilde,  of  monastic  authorship : 

"Auxilio  Petri  jam  carmina  plurima  fed, 
Paule,  doce  mentem  nostram  nunc  plura  referre, 
Quae  doceant  poenas  mentes  tolerare  serenas. 
Pascere  pastor  oves  Domini  paschalis  amore 
Assidue  curans  comitissam  maxime  supra, 
Saepe  recordatam  Christi  memorabat  ad  aram." 


ASSONANCE  31 

Ticknor,  in  his  History  of  Spanish  Literature,  rejects  attempts 
to  trace  assonance  to  Latin  or  Anglo-Norman  sources,  but  calls 
it,  like  end-rhyme,  an  indigenous  development.  He  thinks  early 
assonance,  in  other  than  Spanish  tongues,  due  to  accident  (like 
occasional  end-rhyme  in  Virgil,  etc.),  or  caprice,  or  unsuccessful 
attempts  at  end-rhyme.  The  Spanish  consonants  was  our  Eng- 
lish end-rhyme;  the  asonante  something  between  our  blank 
verse  and  rhyme.  Castilian  abounds  in  vowels,  and  always 
gives  the  same  values  to  the  same  vowels.  Thus  even  Spanish 
prose  is  easily  turned  into  an  eight-syllabled  assonant  ballad  meas- 
ure, which  is  a  natural  and  obvious  verse-form  in  the  language. 
In  the  older  ballads,  as  for  the  most  part  since,  assonance  ap- 
peared in  every  other  line.  After  the  first,  u  and  o,  i  and  e,  ui 
and  u,  etc.,  were  considered  proper  assonances. 

Ticknor  takes  as  characteristic  the  following  from  a  ballad  by 
Gongora  (which  he  accompanies  by  a  translation  from  The 
Retrospective  Review  not  worth  reprinting  here;  it  reads  like  a 
poor  paraphrase  from  Hiawatha,  and  the  assonance  would  not 
be  noticed,  without  explanation,  by  one  English  ear  in  a  thou- 
sand) : 

"Aquel  rayo  de  la  guerra, 
Alferez  mayor  del  reyno, 
Tan  galan  como  valiente, 
Y  tan  noble  como  fiero, 
De  los  mozos  embidiado 
Y  admirado  de  los  viejos, 
Y  de  los  ninos  y  el  vulgo 
Sefialado  con  el  de  do, 
El  querido  de  las  damas, 
Par  cortesano  y  discrete, 
Hijo  hasta  alii  regalado 
De  la  fortuna  y  el  tiempo,"  etc. 

In  general,  Ticknor  considers  futile  the  attempt  to  transfer 
Spanish  assonance  into  English  or  German,  for  the  Teutonic  ear 
does  not  apprehend  it,  like  the  Castilian.  But  he  singles  out  for 
special  praise  Dennis  Florence  McCarthy's  assonant  translations 
of  two  plays  and  an  auto  of  Calderon's:  Love  the  Greatest  En- 
chantment, The  Sorceries  of  Sin,  and  The  Devotion  of  the  Cross, 
calling  them  the  boldest  attempts  ever  made,  in  English  verse, 
and  remarkably  successful:  "Nothing,  I  think,  in  the  English 


32  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

language  will  give  us  so  true  an  impression  of  what  is  most  char- 
acteristic in  the  Spanish  drama  —  perhaps  I  ought  to  say,  of 
what  is  most  characteristic  of  Spanish  poetry  generally." 

To  poet  and  hearer  in  Spanish,  Provencal,  or  Old  French, 
assonance  sounded  sufficiently  strong  to  bind  together  this  or 
that  portion  of  the  verse.  Saintsbury  calls  it  a  fore-echo  of  rhyme ; 
but  the  statement  is  chronologically  inaccurate,  as  assonance  was 
insignificant  in  classical  prosody,  delicately  attuned  as  it  was  to  a 
fine  quantity  lost  to  modern  ears;  while  alliteration  was  in  full 
vigor  before  assonance  made  any  large  mark.  Indeed,  regular 
Castilian  assonance  was  preceded  by  sporadic  cases  of  end- 
rhyme. 

To  Mitford,  the  earliest  important  English  writer  on  the  mel- 
ody of  language,  considered  comparatively,  Italian  and  Spanish 
seemed  "the  fairest  daughters  of  the  Latin."  But  assonance  is  of 
little  importance  in  Dante  and  his  followers ;  so  that  of  all  modern 
tongues  Spanish  alone  retains  it  as  the  distinguishing  mark  of 
poetry.  In  early  abandonment  in  French  —  the  oldest  French 
metrical  romances  were  assonanced  —  is  a  sign  of  its  lack  of 
catholic  adaptability.  But  of  its  charm  in  Spanish  many  have 
spoken.  "Spanish  lyric  poetry,"  said  the  delighted  Mitford, 
"wants  less  assistance  from  that  coarse  ornament  [end- rhyme] 
than  other  modern  European  tongues." 

In  early  English  verse  assonance  was  never  important.  In  the 
border  ballads,  as  in  nursery  jingles  and  crude  careless  verse 
to-day,  it  was  either  incidental  or  used  as  a  substitute  for  more 
finished  rhyme  by  'prentice  hands.  In  ballads  and  morality-plays 
the  pronunciation  was  forced,  for  the  sake  of  the  rhyme,  in  almost 
every  way ;  any  similarity  answered  the  purpose.  Whether  con- 
temporary hearers  of 

"Merie  sungen  the  muneches  binnen  Ely 
Tha  Cnut  ching  rew  therby. 
Roweth  cnihtes  neer  the  land 
And  here  we  thes  muneches  sang  " 

thought  that  the  two  last  lines  were  assonance  or  end-rhyme 
cannot  now  be  told. 

It  is  hard  to  tell  why  some  assonances  are  agreeable,  like  "The 
lowing  herd  winds  slowly  o'er  the  lea,"  while  "The  breezy  call  of 


ASSONANCE  33 

incense-breathing  morn,"  in  the  same  poem,  is  disagreeable  to 
many  modern  ears,  grown  increasingly  fastidious  in  this  matter. 
Assonances  in  adjoining  lines,  as  in  Keats'  Ode  to  Psyche, 
evidently  aroused  no  objection  in  the  poet's  mind,  but  do  not 
seem  admirable  to  most  critics  to-day: 

"And  in  the  midst  of  this  wide  quietness 
A  rosy  sanctuary  will  I  dress 
With  the  wreath'd  trellis  of  a  working  brain, 

With  buds,  and  bells,  and  stars  without  a  name, 
With  all  the  gardener  Fancy  e'er  could  feign, 

Who  breeding  flowers,  will  never  breed  the  same." 

A  similar  assonance  may  be  found  in  the  closing  lines  of  Words- 
worth's sonnet  on  the  sonnet : 

"a  glow-worm  lamp, 

It  cheered  mild  Spenser,  called  from  fairy-land 
To  struggle  through  dark  ways;  and,  when  a  damp 

Fell  round  the  path  of  Milton,  in  his  hand 
The  thing  became  a  trumpet,  whence  he  blew 
Soul-animating  strains  —  alas,  too  few." 

Whatever  may  be  said  for  assonance,  this  line  in  William  Wat- 
son's Lachrymae  Musarum  can  hardly  be  called  felicitous: 

."Bright  Keats  to  touch  his  raiment  doth  beseech;" 

while  in  the  following,  from  The  Hidden  Servants,  by  Francesca 
Alexander,  where  identity  is  added  to  assonance,  the  fault  be- 
comes unendurable: 

"Our  Master  said  that  a  service  done 
To  a  child  of  his  in  a  time  of  need 
Is  done  to  himself  in  very  deed 
And  is  with  love  by  himself  received ! 
So  do  not  think  I  have  been  deceived." 

A  good  example,  in  English,  of  the  intentional  use  of  unaided 
assonance  is  to  be  found  in  the  lyric  by  George  Eliot  in  The 
Spanish  Gypsy,  where  she  experimented  with  the  Spanish  na- 
tional form  of  rhyme.  The  song  undoubtedly  gives  pleasure  to 
the  English  ear,  which  catches  its  melody  before  analyzing  the 
source  of  satisfaction: 

3 


34  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

"Maiden,  crowned  with  glossy  blackness, 

Lithe  as  panther,  forest-roaming, 
Long-armed  naiad,  when  she  dances, 
On  a  stream  of  ether  floating,  — 
Bright,  O  bright  Fedalma  I 

f  Form  all  curves  like  softness  drifted, 

Wave-kissed  marble  roundly  dimpling, 
Far-off  music  slowly  winged, 
Gently  rising,  gently  sinking,  — 
Bright,  O  bright  Fedalma  I" 

Assonance,  more  than  any  other  kind  of  rhyme,  is  a  matter  of 
taste  and  of  ear.  To  one  hearer  at  one  time  it  may  be  a  delicate 
delight ;  to  another  at  another  time  —  or  even  at  the  same  time 
and  in  the  same  country  —  it  is  either  unpleasant  or  impercepti- 
ble. That,  however,  it  still  has  its  uses  in  English  verse  is  proved 
by  the  last  extract,  and  by  the  combination  of  assonance  and 
alliteration  in  the  first  stanza  of  Tennyson's  The  Lotos  Eaters : 

"'Courage,'  he  said,  and  pointed  toward  the  land, 
'This  mounting  wave  will  roll  us  shoreward  soon.' 
In  the  afternoon  they  came  unto  a  land 
In  which  it  seemed  always  afternoon. 
All  round  the  coast  the  languid  air  did  swoon, 
Breathing  like  one  that  hath  a  weary  dream. 
Full-faced  above  the  valley  stood  the  moon  ; 
And  like  a  downward  smoke,  the  slender  stream 
Along  the  cliff  to  fall  and  rise  did  seem." 

Although  assonance  in  English,  as  a  single  rhyme-mark,  would 
be  monotonous  enough,  it  retained  a  place  in  other  nineteenth- 
century  poems,  from  Keats  to  Morris,  in  which  a  peaceful  idyllic 
effect  was  desired.  It  is  usually  combined  with  liquids  and  soft 
end-rhymes  in  such  a  way  as  to  give  new  effects  of  tone-color. 
The  well-known  rhyme- waywardness  of  Mrs.  Browning  was 
largely  due  to  her  assonantal  rhymes,  expressing  her  belief  that 
too  close  a  fettering  of  similar  sounds  is  a  loss  to  freedom  of 
thought  and  to  richness  of  verbal  effect.1  Many  rhymes  ordinarily 
called  "poor"  are  simply  good  assonances.  Here,  as  in  other 
verbal  uses,  it  is  the  poet,  and  not  the  critic,  who  has  the  final 
say-so.  "Only  free,  he  soars  enraptured." 

1  See  page  185. 


END-RHYME 

WHENCE  came  end-rhyme,  the  one  great  mark  of  modern  verse, 
a  thing  so  prominent  that  it  is  used  by  Dante  and  Milton  as  synon- 
ymous with  poetry  itself? 

George  Saintsbury,  the  latest,  fullest,  and  most  important  his- 
torian of  English  prosody,1  dismisses  the  question  promptly 
enough:  "Rhyme  appeared,  no  one  knows  quite  how,  or  why, 
or  whence,  and  at  the  same  time." 

Courthope,  in  his  History  of  English  Poetry,  does  not  develop 
the  subject  at  length,  but  favorably  considers  the  theory  that 
rhyme  passed  from  Arabia  into  Europe.  It  is  of  course  difficult 
to  disprove  the  conjecture  that  Arab  poetry  may  have  influ- 
enced bards  in  Charlemagne's  court,  or  Sicilians  before  Dante; 
but  definite  proofs  of  connection  between  this  or  that  Arabian 
source  and  any  European  result  are  not  discoverable.2  It  seems 
more  reasonable  to  conclude  that  end-rhyme  appeared  early,  in 

1  A  History  of  English  Prosody,  from  the  Twelfth  Century  to  the 
Present  Day.     Vol.  I:  From  the  Origins  to  Spenser;  Vol.  II:  From 
Shakespeare  to  Crabbe.     London:  1906-8. 

2  Under  the  predecessors  of  Frederick  II  (1194-1250),  king  of  Naples 
and  Sicily,  Arabian  poetry  was  still  composed;   "but  in  the  earliest 
Italian  poetry  it  is  impossible  to  find  any  traces  of  Arabian  influence, 
which  could  no  longer  maintain  itself  against  the  popularity  of  the 
Provengal  love-poetry."  —  History  of  Early  Italian  Literature  to  the 
Death  of  Dante;  translated  from  the  German  of  Adolf  Gaspary  by  Her- 
man Oelsner  (London,  1901),  58. 

"Su  lo  scorcio  del  secolo  duodecimo,  vale  a  dire  quando  i  Saraceni 
perseguitati  sgombraron  Palermo,  cercando  ricovero  in  Val  di  Mazara, 
la  voce  triste  ed  ardente  della  poesia  araba  di  Sicilia  improwisamente 
s'estinse."  —  G.  A.  Cesareo :  La  Poesia  SicUiana  sotto  gli  Svevi  (Catania, 
1894),  7. 


36  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

Arabia,  in  accordance  with  natural  laws  of  language  and  poetry, 
manifesting  themselves  independently  in  different  countries.1 

George  Ticknor,  whose  History  of  Spanish  Literature  enjoys 
the  unusual  honor  of  being  authoritative  sixty  years  after  its 
appearance,  dismisses  the  Arabian  theory  as  undeserving  of 
serious  consideration,  and  says  that  both  rhyme  and  romantic 
fiction  "are  now  generally  admitted  to  have  been,  as  it  were, 
spontaneous  products  of  the  human  mind,  which  different  nations 
at  different  periods  have  invented  separately  for  themselves." 
Again,  he  quotes  approvingly  a  remark  by  August  Fuchs  that 
"rhyme  lies  so  deep  in  human  nature  and  in  human  language  that 
it  is  as  little  worth  while  to  discuss  the  origin  of  rhyme  as  the 
origin  of  singing  or  dancing";  and  adds:  "All  nations  have 
shown  a  tendency  to  it,  in  alliteration  or  otherwise"  —  a  conclu- 
sion which  summarizes  the  argument  of  the  present  volume. 

The  influence  of  Latin,  after  it  developed  end-rhyme,  was  un- 
questionably so  great  that  many  scholars  seek  no  farther.  Their 
conclusion  may  be  summarized  in  the  curt  statement  of  C.  F. 
Abdy- Williams :  "Christianity  introduced  two  new  things  into 
its  music:  the  rhyme,  and  the  singing  of  the  prose  words  of 
Scripture.  The  rhyme  was  invented  in  the  early  days,  and  was 
used  to  attract  the  vulgar;  and  the  setting  of  prose  words  to 
music  was  a  novelty  unknown  to  the  ancient  Greeks,  who  only 
sang  poetry.2 

1  "We  have  in  it  the  strange  phenomenon  of  a  literature  as  perfectly 
popular  in  origin  and  use  as  our  ballads,  which  yet  obeys  rigid  norms  of 
metre,  rhyme,  and  form,  and  has  crystallized  into  narrow  convention- 
alities of  structure.  .  .  .    The  poetry  of  Arabia  of  to-day  is  the  same  in 
all  essentials  as  the  poetry  of  Arabia  before  Muhammad.     From  the 
sixth  to  the  twentieth  century  the  stream  has  flowed  unchanging."  - 
D.  B.  Macdonald :  The  Nation,  79 :  518-19. 

Professor  Macdonald  adds  these  valuable  points  in  a  private  letter, 
from  which  I  am  permitted  to  quote : 

"I  know  of  no  direct  evidence  connecting  European  rhyming  with 
that  in  Arabic.  While  there  was  evidently  considerable  interchange  of 
stories  —  and  especially  of  Marchen  —  between  Islam  and  Christendom, 
the  types  of  poetry  seem  to  have  been  too  essentially  different  for  the 
one  to  have  affected  the  other.  .  .  .  Everything  suggests  that  it 
[Arabian  rhyme]  runs  back  to  the  most  primitive  times.  There  is  much 
very  chaotic  rhyme  —  mostly  vowel  only  —  in  the  Hebrew  Old  Testa- 
ment, and  rhymed  prose  seems  to  have  been  the  original  form  of  poetry 
in  Arabic." 

2  The  Story  of  Notation.    London,  1903. 


END-RHYME  37 

Guest  is  inclined  to  trace  end-rhyme  through  Gothic  and  Latin 
back  to  Celtic  Welsh,  say  of  the  sixth  century;  but  Archbishop 
Trench  says  that  it  was  autochthonic,  —  at  first  with  poor  as- 
sonances instead  of  full  consonances ;  the  happy  chances  at  length 
becoming  an  attainment.  Ampere  concludes  that,  beginning 
with  St.  Ambrose,  it  triumphed  in  the  eleventh  century;  "Ce  qui 
n'etait  d'abord  qu'une  fantaisie  de  1'oreille  a  fini  par  devenir  un 
besoin  impe'rieux  et  par  transformer  en  loi.  II  n'est  done  pas 
ne"cessaire  de  chercher  d'autre  origine  a  la  rime;  elle  est  ne'e  du 
sein  de  la  poe"sie  latine  de"ge"nere"e." 

The  Elizabethan  critics  —  of  whom  we  shall  see  more  in  a 
later  chapter  —  copied  each  other  in  saying  that  the  "Goths  and 
Huns"  brought  in  end-rhyme;  that  is,  Northerners  given  to 
alliteration  spread  end-rhyme  before  they  had  adopted  it  them- 
selves. Omne  ignotum  pro  magnifico. 

Guess-work  concerning  the  origin  of  end-rhyme  might  easily 
be  made  to  fill  the  remainder  of  this  volume.  A  single  illustra- 
tion will  show  the  extent  to  which  theorizing  has  gone.  On  the 
basis  of  a  few  doubtful  and  a  few  unquestionable  rhymes  in  Latin 
verse  of  presumably  Irish  authorship,  George  Sigerson  makes 
the  vast  claim  *  that  St.  Sedulius  (Siadal),  who  is  assigned  to  the 
middle  of  the  fifth  century,  introduced  from  the  Irish  the  ter- 
minal sound-echo  or  rhyme  into  Latin  verse ;  and  that  the  influ- 
ence of  his  Carmen  Paschale  "must  have  been  immense.  The 
systematic  adoption  by  its  author  of  rhyme,  assonant  and  con- 
sonant, and  of  alliteration,  must  have  moulded  the  forms  of 
subsequent  literary  production  in  all  the  nascent  languages  of 
Europe,  north  and  south,  as  it  taught  them  the  art  of  alliteration, 
of  assonant  and  of  consonant  rhymes."  The  whole  field  of  liter- 
ary criticism  can  hardly  show  so  sweeping  an  assumption  on  so 
slight  a  basis.  Sedulius  was  not  even  a  significant  pioneer. 

More  sensible,  because  purely  local,  is  Sigerson's  statement,  in 
the  same  article,  that  "In  the  Dan  direach,  or  direct  metre,  of 
Old  Irish,  the  lines  had  to  have  a  certain  number  of  syllables ;  in 
each  quatrain  of  two  couplets  the  sense  might  be  complete  in  the 
couplet,  but  must  be  in  the  quatrain;  two  words  in  each  line 
must  begin  with  a  vowel  or  the  same  consonant ;  the  termination 
1  The  Contemporary  Review,  62:  510. 


38  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

required  the  final  word  of  each  couplet  to  be  one  syllable  longer 
than  the  final  word  in  the  preceding  line ;  and  the  final  word  of 
one  line  chimes  with  a  central  word  in  the  next." 

What  solid  ground,  if  any,  can  be  found  in  these  shifting  sands  ? 
I  believe  that  rhyme,  broadly  defined  as  similarity  of  stressed 
sounds  in  significant  places  in  verse,  and  followed  as  a  natural 
evolution  of  man's  desire  for  rhythmical  expression,  was  certain 
to  appear,  and  did  appear,  independently  in  many  places,  before 
and  after  the  time  when  classical  quantity  was  recognizable. 

Was  rhyme  a  proof  of  a  finer  ear,  or  of  the  need  of  emphasizing 
thought  by  ruder  means  than  those  employed  by  the  classical 
poets?  It  is  certain  that  we  know  something  about  classical 
quantity,  and  it  is  equally  certain  that  we  do  not  know  exactly 
how  Homer  or  Horace  sounded  to  a  Greek  or  Latin  hearer. 
Mitford,  declaring  that  the  harmony  of  quantity  had  vanished 
from  all  modern  languages  and  that  the  harmony  of  quality  had 
been  substituted  in  most  of  them,  said  that  it  was  absurd  to  pre- 
tend to  a  perfect  pronunciation  of  a  language  no  longer  to  be 
known  but  from  books.  Saintsbury  doubts  whether  we  really 
know  anything  about  the  pronunciation  of  Chaucer.  Yet  both 
quantity  and  rhyme  are  surely  matters  of  pronunciation,  and  if 
they  mean  nothing,  or  are  but  miscellanies  of  uncertainties,  we 
may  as  well  throw  all  prosodies  into  the  fire.  What  are  the  facts 
in  the  case? 

As  regards  modern  rhyme,  the  conclusion  of  the  best  scholar- 
ship is  as  follows : 

There  are,  and  always  have  been,  three  kinds  of  rhyme :  allit- 
eration, where  initial  consonant  or  vowel  sounds  are  similar; 
assonance,  where  stressed  included  vowels  are  similar ;  and  end- 
rhyme,  where  the  stress  falls  on  final  vowels,  followed,  if  by  any, 
by  identical  consonants.  All  have  the  same  function,  that  of  an 
agreeable  emphasis  upon  important  ideas,  in  accordance  with  a 
desire  that  is  innate  and  universal,  and  independent  of  con- 
ditions of  time  or  place. 

These  three  kinds  of  rhyme,  then,  are  inherent  in  any  language, 
and  necessarily  bound  to  appear,  separately  or  in  combination. 
In  the  ancient  languages  little  was  made  of  any  one  of  them, 
though  alliteration  appeared  in  the  oldest  Latin  verses ;  while, 


END-RHYME  39 

as  James  Russell  Lowell  says,  "Homer,  like  Dante  and  Shake- 
speare, like  all  who  really  command  language,  seems  fond  of 
playing  with  assonances." 

The  early  Teutonic  tongues  used  alliteration;  end-rhyme 
came  to  them  later,  partly  under  mediaeval  Latin  influences, 
partly  because  of  its  natural  pleasureableness.  The  general  order 
of  development  of  end-rhyme  was  Latin  >  Proven9al  >  French, 
though  German  introduced  it  in  the  ninth  century  and  Icelandic 
in  the  tenth.  In  Spanish,  assonance  was  the  indigenous  and 
satisfactory  rhyme-art. 

Alliteration,  assonance,  and  end-rhyme  enjoyably  emphasize 
stressed  ideas ;  the  two  latter  are  better  able  to  bind  verses  into 
idea-groups  or  stanzas. 

The  more  highly  inflected  a  language,  the  more  readily  it  de- 
velops end-rhyme,  and  vice  versa.  The  great  exception  afforded 
by  Greek  and  Latin  of  the  classical  period  is  explained  by  their 
delicate,  and  now  imperfectly  understood,  sense  of  quantity. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  Italian,  which  is  really  a  new  Latin,  is  almost 
pre-eminent,  among  modern  languages,  in  the  fluency  of  its 
rhymes,  while  mediaeval  Latin  itself  —  as  examples  will  presently 
show  —  is  perhaps  the  most  facile  of  all  tongues,  ancient  or 
modern,  in  the  effective  beauty  of  its  late-developed  end-rhymes. 

Proven9al  assonance  became  end-rhyme  by  the  easiest  of  steps ; 
while  in  the  fullest  of  mediaeval  literatures  (1100-1400),  the 
English,  we  can  see  how  alliteration,  with  the  development  of 
study  of  continental  languages,  and  with  the  increase  of  the 
vocabulary,  yielded  little  by  little  to  end-rhyme.  The  strength 
inherent  in  alliteration  approved  it  to  crude  early  tongues ;  end- 
rhyme  came  with  the  time  when  verse  was  a  matter  not  of  ex- 
clamation but  of  elaborated  thought.  Meanwhile  the  chants  and 
even  the  sermons  of  the  church,  with  their  sing-song  and  paral- 
lelism, were  a  powerful  aid  in  the  development  of  the  new 
word-music. 

In  this  new  music  the  time-beater  was  also  an  effective  thought- 
transmitter.  Poe  stated  the  case  thus:  "Lines  being  once  in- 
troduced, the  necessity  of  distinctly  defining  these  lines  to  the  ear 
(as  yet  written  verse  does  not  exist)  would  lead  to  a  scrutiny  of 
their  capabilities  at  their  terminations;  and  now  would  spring 


40  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

up  the  idea  of  equality  in  sound  between  the  final  syllables  —  in 
other  words,  of  rhyme." 

Still  earlier,  Mitford's  investigations  had  led  him  to  the  conclu- 
sions that  end-rhyme  "is  so  important  that,  though  without  anal- 
ogy in  music,  wholly  unrelated  to  melody,  and  only  in  its  office  of 
time-beater  connected  with  measure,  scarcely  can  any  verse  in 
our  language  stand  without  it,  excepting  the  epic,  which  indeed 
often  dispenses  with  it  most  advantageously."  Again:  "Rhyme 
is  an  ornament  not  of  a  quiet  and  unobtrusive  character,  but,  on 
the  contrary,  so  forcing  itself  upon  the  ear's  notice,  —  generally, 
indeed,  under  good  management,  agreeably  —  that,  with  some 
of  very  gross  and  untutored  perception,  it  stands  instead,  almost, 
of  all  other  grace." 

It  is  difficult  to  understand  how  a  writer  on  the  "harmony  of 
language"  could  say  that  rhyme  was  "without  analogy  in  music, 
wholly  unrelated  to  melody,  and  only  in  its  office  of  time-beater 
connected  with  measure."  In  fact,  the  development  of  end- 
rhyme  in  modern  times  was  a  direct  result  of  the  development  of 
music,  the  ear  demanding  more  strikingly  agreeable  linguistic 
effects.  But  to  Mitford,  in  whom  survived  some  of  the  Eliza- 
bethan contempt  for  rhyme,  it  was  only  a  sort  of  higher  drum- 
beat. Just  what  he  got  out  of  Shakespeare's  sonnets  or  Spen- 
ser's Faerie  Queene  I  do  not  know.  Still,  however,  he  perceived 
that  the  line-division  by  rhyme  was  related  to  a  larger  thing: 
"Among  rhymes  a  verse  is  not  the  highest  denomination  of  poet- 
ical measure;  it  is  but  a  part  of  a  larger  measure,  to  which 
rhyme  in  a  great  degree  gives  form  and  proportion,  and  alone 
gives  boundary";  and  he  affably  admitted  that  rhyme  was  "the 
common  crutch  and  stilt  of  poetry  in  all  the  languages  of  modern 
Europe."  He  evidently  believed  that  without  rhyme,  save  in  the 
epic,  there  could  be  no  modern  verse.  Others  have  agreed  with 
him  in  the  view  that  unrhymed  verse  in  French  "can  be  verse 
only  in  name  and  written  form,  having  nothing  essential  to  dis- 
tinguish it  from  the  merest  prose." 

The  development  of  end-rhyme  in  Latin  forms  a  doubly  in- 
teresting theme;  for  though  late  in  appearing  it  was  early  in  its 
influence  upon  the  entire  body  of  mediaeval  European  poetry. 

When  classical  quantity  ruled,  end-rhyme  was  not  needed,  or 


END-RHYME  41 

was  possibly  cacophonous,  like  excessive  alliteration  to-day. 
Non-rhyming  Latin  poets  apparently  had  to  avoid  frequent  rhyme 
because  of  the  natural  tendency  of  inflectional  terminations  to  run 
into  rhyme.  Trench  says  that  end-rhyme  was  so  inherent  in 
Latin  as  continually  to  reappear,  "being  no  doubt  with  difficulty 
avoided  by  those  writers  whose  stricter  sense  of  beauty  taught 
them  not  to  catch  at  ornaments  which  were  not  properly  theirs." 
Yet  even  in  classical  Latin  poetry  rhyme  was  probably  regarded 
as  a  permissible  occasional  ornament,  or  mnemonic  device,  or 
pleasantry ;  Latin  charms  jingle ;  and  Plautus  often,  and  Virgil 
sometimes,  rhymes.  Trench,  in  the  introduction  to  his  Sacred 
Latin  Poetry,  cites  from  Ennius'  Andromache : 

"Haec  omnia  vidi  inflammari, 
Priamo  vi  vitam  evitari, 
Jovis  aram  sanguine  turpari ; " 

from  Ovid : l 

"Quern  mare  carpentem  substrictaque  crura  gerentem;" 
."Quot  coelum  stellas,  tot  habet  tua  Roma  puellas;" 

(For  many  years  a  stock  illustration  of  rhyme  in  classical 

Latin.) 

from  Martial : 

."Sic  leve  flavorum  valeat  genus  Usipiorum;" 

from  Claudian: 

."Flora  cruentanun  praetenditur  umbra  jubarum;" 

from  Horace: 

"Multa  recedentes  adimunt.    Ne  forte  seniles 
Mandentur  juveni  partes,  pueroque  viriles;" 

and  from  Virgil : 

"Limus  ut  hie  durescit,  et  haec  ut  cera  liquescit;" 
"Nee  non  Tarquinium  ejectum  Porsena  jubebat 
Accipere,  ingentique  urbem  obsidione  premebat." 

1  "Toutefois  si  Guide  en  a  us6,  je  croy  que  c'est  par  rencontre,  plus 
tost  que  par  loy  ou  subiection  d'aucun  genre  de  vers,  ou  reigle  versifica- 
toire."  —  CLAUDE  FAUCHET:  Recvil  de  VOrigine  de  la  Langve  et  Poesie 
Francoise,  Ryme  et  Romans.  Paris,  1581. 


42  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

He  also  refers  to  Mneid,  I,  319,  320;  III,  656,  657;  IV,  256,  257; 
V,  383,  386;  VIII,  620,  621. 

To  these  we  may  add  the  second  line  of  Horace's  famous 

f'Omne  tulit  punctum  qui  miscuit  utile  dulci, 
Lectorem  delectando  pariterque  monendo," 

in  which  the  assonantal-rhyme  delectando  :  monendo  must  have 
been  intentional,  whatever  we  may  think  about  lectorem :  delec- 
tando. 

In  only  one  of  the  lines  having  internal  rhyme  —  "Limus  ut 
hie  durescit,  et  haec  ut  cera  liquescit"  —  do  quantity-stress  and 
rhyme-stress  coincide.  How,  for  instance,  shall  we  preserve  both 
of  them  in  reading  "Flora  cruentarum  praetenditur  umbra  ju- 
barum,"  or  the  jocose  later  line  "Est  avis  in  dextra  melior  quam 
quattuor  extra"  ? 

Dingeldein,  in  his  excellent  and  comprehensive  monograph  on 
the  subject,1  gives  many  examples  of  sporadic  end-rhyme  in 
Greek  and  Latin  poets.  So  does  Norden,  who  also  notes  the 
early  appearance  of  that  parallelism  considered  in  a  previous 
chapter,  and,  like  the  sixteenth-  and  seventeenth-century 
French  and  English  critics  of  poetry,  makes  something  of  the 
Greek  homoioteleuton  as  a  kind  of  early  end-rhyme,  even  in  prose.2 

Poe  called  "an  effective  species  of  ancient  rhyming"  such 
lines  as 

"Parturiunt  montes  et  nascitur  ridicuZws  mus." 
"Litoreis  ingens  inventa  sub  iliciZws  sus." 

He  also  thought  that  the  terminal  system  must  have  caused  the 
Latins  to  give  a  greater  emphasis  than  ours  to  final  syllables; 
and  that  Horace  did  not  scan  his  own  verse  as  the  classical  proso- 
dists  claim.  His  melodious  "true  scansion"  of  Horace's  Integer 
vitae  may  be  found  in  his  well-known  paper  on  "The  Rationale 
of  Verse." 

1  Otto  Dingeldein :  Der  Reim  bei  den  Griechen  und  Romern.  Leipzig, 
1892. 

9  Thus  Cicero:  "Volvendi  sunt  libri  Catonis:  intelliges  nihil  illius 
lineamentis,  nisi  eorum  pigmentorum,  quae  inventa  nondum  erant, 
florem  et  colorem  defuisse";  Pliny  the  Younger:  "Illam  veram  et 
meram  Graeciam";  and  Plautus:  "Amor  et  melle  et  felle  est 
fecundissimus." 


END-RHYME  43 

Trench,  who  was  the  pioneer  in  the  investigation  of  the  history 
of  Latin  mediaeval  religious  poetry,  says  that  Latin  verse  gradu- 
ally substituted  accent  for  quantity,  and  then  employed  rhyme, 
within  the  verse  and  at  its  end,  as  a  means  of  marking  rhythm, 
and  as  a  resource  for  producing  melody.  There  was  no  abso- 
lutely necessary  connection  between  accent  and  rhyme ;  we  have 
in  our  own  blank  verse  accent  without  rhyme,  while  the  monkish 
poets  wrote  rhymed  hexameters,  pentameters,  and  Sapphics,  — 
i.  e.,  in  quantity  and  feet,  without  accent. 

Meanwhile  the  Greek  homoioteleuton,  the  Latin  similiter  de- 
sinens,  the  "finissant  de  mesme"  of  Fauchet  —  "quelque  fois 
plaisante  et  receue  en  prose  oration,"  more  and  more  affected  all 
kinds  of  composition,  especially  the  religious  prose  of  the  early 
church,  e.  g.,  Augustine's  sermons,  from  which  Trench  cites: 
lingua  clamat,  cor  amat;  in  Novo  [Testamento]  patent,  quae  in 
Vetere  latent;  praecedat  spes,  ut  sequatur  res;  quis  est  enim  fides, 
nisi  credere  quod  non  vides;  hoc  agamus  bene,  ut  illud  habeamus 
plene ;  ibi  [in  coelis]  nullus  oritur,  quia  nullus  moritur. 

In  favor  of  the  theory  that  rhyme  is  a  thing  of  indigenous 
origin,  Trench  speaks  in  no  doubtful  voice.  Man  craves,  and 
deeply  delights  in,  the  rhythmic  and  periodic,  —  for  instance,  in 
the  sound  of  waves  on  the  beach  or  of  men  on  the  march.  The 
Latin  language  has  one  word  for  the  solemn  and  the  recurring. 
"Rhyme  can  as  little  be  considered  the  exclusive  discovery  of  any 
one  people  as  of  any  single  age.  It  is  rather,  like  poetry,  like 
music,  like  dramatic  representation,  the  natural  result  of  a  deep 
craving  of  the  human  mind ;  as  it  is  the  well-nigh  inevitable  ad- 
junct of  a  poetry  not  quantitative,  being  almost  certain  to  make 
a  home  for  itself  therein.  In  this  universality  of  rhyme  .  .  . 
peculiar  neither  to  the  rudeness  of  our  early  and  barbarous  age, 
nor  to  the  over-refined  ingenuity  of  a  late  and  artificial  one,  but 
running  through  whole  literatures  from  their  beginning  to  their 
end,  we  find  its  best  defence.  It  lies  deep  in  our  human  nature, 
and  satisfies  an  universal  need.  .  .  "  We  encounter  it  every- 
where :  in  the  Welsh  and  the  Irish  of  the  west ;  the  Sanskrit,  the 
Arabic,  the  Persian,  and  the  Chinese  of  the  east ;  and  the  Gothic 
and  the  Scandinavian  of  the  north.  It  is  "no  formal  discovery," 
"but  in  all,  the  well-nigh  instinctive  result  of  that  craving  after 


44  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

periodic  recurrence,  proportion,  limitation,  —  of  that  sense  out 
of  which  all  rhythm  and  metre  springs." 

Latin  sacred  poetry  was  satisfying  because  it  combined  a 
rhythm-mark  with  a  new  melody,  the  one  promoting  and  sustain- 
ing the  other.  Quantity,  in  the  fading  away  of  classical  learning, 
became  less  and  less  known,  while  every  one  recognized  accent. 
Indeed,  "quantity  itself  was  not  indigenous  to  the  Latin  soil, 
and  therefore  had  struck  no  deep  root" ;  so  the  later  poets  aban- 
doned the  ancient  metres,  to  "expatiate  in  the  free  region  of 
accented  verse."  Then  came  Christian  chanting,  with  real,  not 
fictitious  and  inconsistent,  values  for  the  ear.  Latin  rhyme,  thus 
naturally  appearing  after  a  period  of  suppression,  belongs  to  the 
third  and  fourth  Christian  centuries,  though  not  largely  employed 
before  the  eighth  or  ninth.  Thenceforward  it  was  used  in  every 
sort  of  way :  within  the  line,  at  the  end,  in  pentameters,  in  hexam- 
eters, in  Sapphics,  etc.  At  first  it  was  "very  far  from  that  elab- 
orate and  perfect  instrument  which  it  afterwards  became."  As- 
sonance was  enough,  to  begin  with ;  then  rhymes  were  used  only 
when  convenient;  sometimes  they  fell  on  unstressed  syllables, 
and  sometimes  they  had  only  the  same  ending-letter.  But  from 
"rude,  timid,  and  uncertain  beginnings,  rhyme  came  in  the 
twelfth  and  thirteenth  centuries  to  display  all  its  latent  capa- 
bilities and  attain  its  final  glory,  satiating  the  ear  with  a  richness 
of  melody  scarcely  anywhere  to  be  surpassed." 

The  early  Latin  hymns  ranged  all  the  way  from  loose  similari- 
ties of  sound,  anywhere  in  the  lines,  to  assonances  at  the  end, 
visible  identities  of  unaccented  last  syllables,  and  absolute  end- 
rhymes.  Sometimes  the  same  word  ended  alternate  stanzas,  as 
we  would  now  call  them.  Repetitions  seem  to  have  answered 
every  purpose  of  rhymes ;  and  end-rhymes  themselves,  when  in- 
troduced, occur  sporadically.  By  such  means,  perhaps,  accentual 
metre,  addressed  to  the  comparatively  illiterate,  became  the  verse 
of  the  church,  which,  says  Fauchet,  "ayans  ceux  qui  prenoient 
plaisir  a  la  versification,  employ^  tout  leur  esprit  a  composer  des 
vers  de  cadence  unisone  vulgairement  nominee  ryme." 

In  the  twelve  hymns  attributed  to  Ambrosius,  bishop  of  Milan 
(333  ?-397),  the  lines  are  frequently,  but  not  regularly,  rhymed. 
Ambrose's  authorship  is  clearly  established  in  but  four  hymns: 


END-RHYME  45 

"Deus  creator  omnium";  "Aeterne  rerum  conditor";  "Veni 
redemptor  gentium";  "lam  surgit  hora  tertia."  He  introduced 
the  practice  of  singing  choral  hymns  antiphonally  arranged 
(cantus  Ambrosianus) ;  and  wisely  selected  the  metre  least 
markedly  metrical  and  most  nearly  rhythmical  —  the  iambic 
dimeter  —  in  a  movement  toward  emancipation  from  classical 
pagan  forms  and  restraints.  It  was  really,  says  Trench,  a  return 
to  the  freedom  of  early  Latin  un-Grecised  verse,  in  which  place- 
marked  stresses  were  more  important  than  accurate  feet. 

Ampere  says  that  Ambrose's  hymns  show  "une  tendance  a  la 
rime  se  produire  evidemment  dans  ces  strophes  analogues  a 
celles  d'Horace.  Ce  qui  sera  le  fondement  de  la  prosodie  des 
temps  modernes,  la  rime,  n'est  pas  encore  une  loi  de  la  versifica- 
tion, et  deja  un  besoin  mysterieux  de  1'oreille  1'introduit  dans  les 
vers  pour  ainsi  dire  a  1'insu  d'oreille  elle  me'me."  1 

These  points  will  be  made  clear  by  quoting,  entire,  the  hymn 
which  is  perhaps  the  best  of  the  four  undoubtedly  written  by 
Ambrose : 

"DE  ADVENTU  DOMINI 

"Veni,  Redemptor  gentium, 
Ostende  partum  Virginis; 
Miretur  omne  saeculum : 
Talis  decet  partus  Deum. 

"Non  ex  virile  semine, 
Sed  mystico  spiramine, 
Verbum  Dei  factum  est  caro, 
Fructusque  ventris  floruit. 

"Alvus  tumescit  Virginis, 
Claustrum  pudoris  permanet, 
Vexilla  virtutum  micant, 
Versatur  in  templo  Deus. 

"Procedit  e  thalamo  suo, 
Pudoris  aula  regia, 
Geminae  Gigas  substantiae,' 
Alacris  ut  currat  viam. 

"Egressus  ejus  a  Patre, 
Regressus  ejus  ad  Patrem, 
Excursus  usque  ad  inferos, 
Recursus  ad  sedem  Dei. 

1  Histoire  Litteraire  de  la  France,  I,  411. 


46  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

"Aequalis  aeterno  Patri, 
Carnis  tropaeo  cingere, 
Infirma  nostri  corporis 
Virtute  firmans  perpeti. 

"Praesepe  jam  fulget  tuum, 
Lumenque  nox  spirat  novum, 
Quod  nulla  nox  interpolet, 
Fideque  jugi  luceat." 

This  hymn  is  on  the  whole  a  fair  representative  of  the  New- 
Latin  verse  of  its  time.  In  its  thought-rhymes,  sound-rhymes 
irregularly  put  in  this  or  that  place,  identities,  assonances,  etc., 
it  is  constructively  something  like  modern  juvenile  jingles,  in 
which  the  immature  mind  does  not  care  for  nice  accuracies. 

Sedulius,  in  the  first  half  of  the  fifth  century,  followed  similar 
methods.  In  one  of  his  hymns  the  same  words  form  both  the 
first  half  of  the  hexameter  and  the  second  half  of  the  pentameter 
(epanaleptic  construction),  the  result,  according  to  Teuffel  and 
Schwabe  (History  of  Roman  Literature),  "being  intolerably 
monotonous."  Another  hymn  is  a  so-called  abecedarius.  The 
suppression  of  final  m,  s,  t,  then  customary,  says  the  same  au- 
thority, —  shows  itself  in  rhymes  such  as  inpie :  times;  personat : 
pignora  ;  millia :  victimam  ;  plurimus :  febrium. 

In  the  ringing  "Vexilla  regis  proderunt"  (written  a  little  later) 
are  rhymes  throughout,  but  without  any  fixed  rule  as  to  sequence 
or  alternation. 

Trochaic  tetrameter  is  well  suited  to  the  Latin  language  and 
also  to  church  hymns,  as,  for  instance,  in  the  anonymous  "Ap- 
parebit  repentina  dies  magna  Domini."  In  this  metre  assonance 
easily  took  its  place. 

At  this  time  we  reach  the  earliest  English  writer  on  poetry,  — 
Bede,  —  who  says  nothing  about  rhyme,  but  gives  the  following 
interesting  passage : 

"Videtur  autem  rhythmus  metris  esse  consimilis,  quae  est 
verborum  modulata  compositio  non  metrica  ratione,  sed  numero 
syllabarum  ad  judicium  aurium  examinata,  ut  sunt  carmina 
vulgarium  poetarum.  Et  quidem  rhythmus  sine  metro  esse 
potest,  metrum  vero  sine  rhythmo  esse  non  potest:  quod  liqui- 
dius  ita  definitur.  Metrum  est  ratio  com  modulatione ;  rhythmus 


END-RHYME  47 

modulatio  sine  ratione :  plerumque  tamen  casu  quodam  invenies 
etiam  rationem  in  rhythmo  non  artificis  moderatione  servatam, 
sed  sono  et  ipsa  modulatione  ducente,  quern  vulgares  poetae 
necesse  est  rustice,  docti  f  aciant  docte ;  quomodo  et  ad  instar  iam- 
bici  metri  pulcherrime  f actus  est  hymnus  ille  praeclarus : 

f'[O]  Rex  aeterne  Domine, 
Rerum  creator  omnium 
Qui  eras  ante  secula 
Semper  cum  patre  films. 

Et  alii  Ambrosiani  non  pauci.  Item  ad  formam  metri  trochaic! 
canunt  hymnum  de  die  judicii  per  alphabetum: 

Apparebit  repentina 
Dies  magna  Domini, 
Fur  obscura  velut  nocte 
Improvises  occupans."  * 

Fauchet's  comment  on  this  passage  is  as  follows : 

"Mais  ne  trouvant  en  ces  Hymnes  aucune  cadence  omiotel- 
eute,  ie  pense  que  le  Rhythmus  des  Poetes  dont  Bede  parle, 
n'estoit  qu'un  vers  de  certaine  quantite  de  syllabes  sans  loy  ne 
pieds,  tel  que  ces  deux  couples  Latines  cydessus  transcriptes 
["Rex  aeterne  Domine"  and  "Apparebit  repentina"],  lequel 
n'estant  en  usage  entre  les  doctes,  Terentianus  Maurus  n'a 
daigne  en  faire  mention  en  sa  versificatoire." 

In  the  work  of  Marbod  (1035-1125),  Bishop  of  Rennes,  is  a 
perfect  specimen  of  end-rhyme: 

"ORATIO  ADDOMINUM 

."Deus-homo,  Rex  coelorum, 
Miserere  miserorum ; 
Ad  peccandum  proni  sumus, 
Et  ad  humum  redit  humus ; 
Tu  ruinam  nostram  fulci 
Pietate  tua  dulci. 
Quid  est  homo,  proles  Adae? 
Germen  necis  dignum  clade. 
Quid  est  homo  nisi  vermis, 
Res  infirma,  res  inermis? 

1  Bedae  Venerabilis  De  Arte  Metrica:  24:  De  Rhythmo. 


48  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

Ne  digneris  huic  irasci, 
Qui  non  potest  mundus  nasci : 
Noli,  Deus,  hunc  damnare, 
Qui  non  potest  non  peccare; 
ludicare  non  est  aequum 
Creaturam,  non  est  tecum;  . 
Non  est  miser  homo  tanti, 
Ut  respondeat  Tonanti. 
Sicut  umbra,  sicut  fumus, 
Sicut  f oenum  facti  sumus : 
Miserere,  Rex  coelorum, 
Miserere  miserorum." 

In  this  melodious  little  lyric  the  rhymes  Adae :  clade  and 
aequum :  tecum  give  us  an  intimation  of  contemporary  pronun- 
ciation. 

In  the  twelfth  century  came  the  once  famous  "leonine" 
rhyme  (the  origin  of  the  term  is  not  known),  hexameters  in  which 
the  syllables  before  the  caesura  rhymed  with  the  final  syllables. 
For  it  Trench  has  no  liking ;  it  is  useless,  he  says,  to  try  to  super- 
induce end-rhyme  on  the  classical  hexameter  —  a  remark  which 
may  also  be  made  of  our  few  and  mostly  poor  English  hexameters. 

At  about  the  same  time  appeared  the  great  3000-line  De  Con- 
temptu  Mundi  of  Bernard  of  Clugny,  or  Bernard  of  Morlaix; 
born  in  Morlaix,  Brittany,  of  English  parents ;  monk  of  Clugny, 
1122-1156.  The  author,  like  an  early  Jones  Very,  believed  him- 
self inspired  in  the  composition  of  these  tripping  hexameters,  so 
prodigal  in  assonances  and  rhymes  of  every  kind.  Certainly  the 
world  had  a  new  music  in 

"Hora  novissima,  tempora  pessima  sunt,  vigilemus. 
Ecce  minaciter  imminet  arbiter  ille  supremus. 
Prominet,  imminet  ut  mala  terminet,  de  qua  coronet, 
Recta  remuneret,  anxia  libere,  aethera  donet, 
Auferet  aspera  duraque  pondera  mentis  onustae 
Sobria  muniat,  improba  puniat,  utraque  juste." 

Assonance  is  frequent,  as  in 

"Pax  sine  crimine,  pax  sine  turbine,  pax  sine  rixa, 
Meta  laboribus,  atque  tumultibus  anchora  fixa." 

This  easy  careless  jingle  may  become  displeasing  or  ludicrous ; 
loose  facility  of  rhyming  is  a  positive  distress  to  some  delicate 
ears  in  such  lines  as 


END-RHYME  49 

"Est  tibi  laurea,  dos  datur  aurea,  sponsa  decora, 
Primaque  Principis  oscula  suscipis,  inspicis  ora," 

where  end-rhyme,  assonance,  and  alliterative  or  other  contrasts, 
accented  or  unaccented,  are  thrown  together  almost  at  random. 
Not  until  modern  times  did  rhymed  Latin  verse  recover  from  the 
dangerously  fascinating  looseness  of  lines  like 

"Urbs  Syon  inclyta,  turns  et  edita  littore  tuto, 
Te  peto,  te  colo,  te  flagro,  te  volo,  canto,  saluto." 

If  the  metres  of  Virgil  and  Horace  were  to  degenerate  into  this, 
we  can  understand,  in  part,  why  classic  Latin  so  sedulously 
avoided  rhyme,  and  why  the  sixteenth-century  crusade  against 
rhyme  in  English  enlisted  so  many  classical  scholars. 

It  is  not  worth  while  to  descend  to  the  examination  of  the 
various  tricks  in  rhyme  which  amused  mediaeval  verse-mongers, 
in  Latin  as  elsewhere.  There  were  acrostics,  mesostics,  telestics ; 
poems  in  the  form  of  a  cross,  a  serpent  or  other  object ;  poems 
with  a  fixed  number  of  letters,  or  without  a  specified  letter; 
those  in  which  all  lines  ended  in  e,  i,  or  o;  those  in  which  the  first 
line  consisted  of  two-syllable  words,  the  second  of  three-,  the 
third  of  four-,  and  the  fourth  of  five-,  while  the  fifth  had  each  suc- 
cessive word  contain  one  syllable  more  than  the  preceding.  Then 
there  would  be  eight  parts  of  speech  in  eight  successive  words, 
etc.  Of  course  riddles,  as  difficult  as  Cynewulf's  and  as  stupid 
when  unravelled,  were  manufactured;  and  a  favorite  experi- 
ment was  to  compose  lines  reading  both  ways,  like  "Roma  tibi 
subito  motibus  ibit  amor."  Macaronic  poetry  —  a  mixture  of 
languages  in  the  same  poem  —  was  another  device.  Its  vagaries 
cannot  be  followed  here ;  sometimes  it  was  even  trilingual,  as  in 

"A  celuy  que  pluys  eime  en  movnde, 
Of  al!6  tho  that  I  have  found, 

Carissima, 

Saluz  od  treye1  amour, 
With  grace  and  joye  and  alle  honour, 

Dvlcissima."  l 

All  this  wealth  of  Latin  rhyme,  especially  as  it  was  under 
church  control,  was  naturally  influential  upon  every  European 

1  Early  English  Lyrics,  Amorous,  Divine,  Moral,  and  Trivial.  'Chosen 
by  E.  K.  Chambers  and  F.  Sidgwick.  London,  1907. 

4 


50  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

language,  —  chiefly  upon  those  derived  from  Latin.  But  this 
influence  was  not  inconsistent  with  the  independent  exercise  of 
the  rhyme  instinct. 

Such,  then,  was  the  curious  product  which  Mitford,  without 
very  full  knowledge,  inaccurately  described  in  his  remark  that 
"the  Middle  Ages  produced  a  kind  of  popular  Latin  verse,  com- 
posed in  accentual  cadence  without  any  regard  to  metre,  and  for 
ornament  adopting  rhyme." 

Before  dismissing  this  rich  subject,  it  should  be  noted  that  the 
power  of  producing  Latin  rhyme  continues  in  England,  from 
poets  to  schoolboys.1  The  mediaeval  Latin  versifiers  never  turned 
out  anything  more  melodious  than  Swinburne's  hymn  assigned  to 
"Aloys  of  Blois,"  in  Rosamond,  beginning: 

"Fautor  meus,  magne  Deus,  quis  adversum  tibi  stabit? 
Parum  ridet  qui  te  videt;  sponsam  sponsus  accusabit; 
Sicut  herbam  qui  superbam  flatu  gentem  dissipabit, 
Flectit  coelum  quasi  velum  quo  personam  accusabit." 

As  Proven£al  was  the  oldest  daughter  of  Latin,  one  naturally 
encounters,  here  and  there,  remarks  to  the  effect  that  the  new 
rhymed  lyric  of  the  mediaeval  world  —  of  love,  or  loyalty,  or 
war  —  had  its  birth  in  Provence.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  end-rhyme 
appeared  in  German  and  Icelandic,  and  even  in  French,  earlier 
than  in  Proven9al.  Distinction  belongs  to  the  songs  of  southern 
France  —  in  which  cadence  is  strongly  marked  by  accent  —  not 
so  much  for  priority  in  the  use  of  rhyme  as  for  prodigal  ingenuity 
in  its  employment,  and  for  the  development  of  the  widely  popular 
lyric  of  compliment,  courtship,  the  tournament,  and  the  field 
of  battle.  Songs  on  these  themes  were  bound  to  appear  as 
soon  as  medievalism  found  its  voice;  and  for  geographical, 
social,  and  linguistic  reasons  they  first  reached  maturity  in 
Proven9al. 

The  first  period  of  Provencal  literature  belongs  to  the  tenth  and 
eleventh  centuries.  Originally  Latin  words  and  half-Latin  words 
were  intermingled.  End-rhyme  was  used  at  the  start,  in  couplets 
and  in  stanzas  of  four  verses.  A  frequent  arrangement  was  that 
of  eight-syllable  verse  in  rhymed  couplets;  feminine  rhymes, 

1  See  the  Latin  translations  in  Florilegium  Latinum,  edited  by  F.  St. 
J.  Thackeray  and  E.  D.  Stone,  2  vols.,  London,  1899-1902. 


END-RHYME  51 

when  appearing,  making  nine  syllables.  Epic  poems  were  written 
in  ten-syllable  verses.  There  were  some  alexandrines,  with  a 
caesura  after  the  sixth  syllable.  Rhymed  couplets  of  six-syllable 
verses  were  employed  in  didactic  poetry.  The  number  of  sylla- 
bles in  lyrical  lines  varied  from  one  to  twelve;  corresponding 
verses  must  have  the  same  number.  When,  in  a  poem,  verses 
were  united  to  form  strophes  or  coblas,  they  were  often 
in  three  parts,  the  rhymes  of  the  first  two  arranged  in  inverse 
order. 

The  earlier  rhymes  lacked  the  flexibility  and  variety  after- 
wards acquired,  but  were,  from  the  first,  of  remarkable 
accuracy. 

Assonance  often  appeared.  Masculine  rhymes  were  first  used, 
and  the  utterance  of  the  verse  was  evidently  slow.  Any  one 
dialect  is  seldom  represented  in  its  purity ;  the  poets  using  words 
from  various  sources  as  the  exigencies  of  rhyme  and  metre  sug- 
gested. Their  work  has  reached  us  through  many  intermediate 
hands,  of  little  linguistic  exactitude,  and  there  is  no  generally 
accepted  system  of  orthography.  As  regards  the  rhymes,  fur- 
thermore, some  features  of  the  pronunciation  are  obscure. 
"When  we  meet  in  a  late  text,"  says  Professor  C.  H.  Grandgent, 
"such  a  word  as  flor,  we  cannot  be  certain  whether  it  is  to  be 
sounded  flor  (close  o)  or  ffor  (sound  of  French  ou)." 

Proven9al  poetry  differed  from  other  verse  in  that  the  same 
rhymes  usually  ran  through  the  entire  poem.  The  poets  delighted 
in  piling  rhyme  on  rhyme,  regardless  of  meaning.  Thus  the  last 
part  of  Le  Tezaurs  (Treasures)  of  the  troubadour  Peire  de 
Corbiac  (thirteenth  century)  —  as  given  in  Bartsch's  Chrestom- 
athie  Provenqale  —  presents  no  less  than  one  hundred  and  eleven 
lines  ending  in  ens,  the  result  being  very  monotonous.  This  curi- 
ous piece  consists  of  a  rhymed  list  of  authors  and  books  known 
to  the  writer. 

The  forty-five  lines  of  a  song  by  Alphonso  II  have  only  two 
rhymes :  atz  and  ors. 

One  of  the  devices  of  Proven9al  rhyme  is  illustrated  in  Professor 
Justin  H.  Smith's  full  account,  with  many  translations,  of  The 
Troubadours  at  Home  (2  vols.,  New  York,  1899),  vol.  I,  pp.  102, 
430.  The  stanza  is  Raimbaut  d' Aurenga's : 


52  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

"E  pois  ieu  li  sui  veraia 
beis  taing  qu'el  me  sia  verais 
qu'anc  de  lui  amar  non  m'estrais 
m  ai  cor  que  m'en  estraia;  " 

the  quality  of  which  Professor  Smith  preserves  in  his  version : 

"Since  I  love  my  love  so  deeply, 

It  must  be  that  his  love  is  deep, 

For  never  will  his  love  seem  cheap  — 

Never  could  I  prize  it  cheaply." 

"When  rhyme  first  appeared  in  the  modern  languages,"  says 
Ticknor,  "an  excess  of  it  was  the  natural  consequence  of  its 
novelty."  Luxuriant  indeed  were  the  rhyming  powers  of  the 
Provencal  bards  of  southern  France  in  their  golden  age:  the 
twelfth  and  thirteenth  centuries.  "Rhyme,"  says  John  Earle, 
"has  developed  its  luxuriance  in  its  natural  regions,  that  is  to  say 
in  the  Romanesque  dialects.  The  rhyming  faculty  in  our  [Eng- 
lish] speech  has  suffered  by  deflexionalization,  and  this  is  why 
the  English  language  is  found  to  be  poor  in  rhymes  when  it  is 
severely  tested,  as  in  the  essay  of  translating  Dante  in  his  own 
terzd,  rima."  That  English  is  vastly  poorer  than  Italian  in  femi- 
nine endings  is  certainly  true ;  but  Earle  seems  here  to  forget,  in 
our  own  tongue,  such  a  poem  as  Swinburne's  Faustine. 

Peire  de  Corbiac's  best  poem  is  a  Hymn  to  the  Virgin,  in  which 
there  is  an  originality  not  to  be  found  in  most  Troubadour  hymns, 
which  are  mainly  translations  or  paraphrases  from  the  Latin. 
The  first  stanza  is  as  follows : 

."Domna,  dels  angels  regina, 
esperansa  dels  crezens, 
segon  quern  aonda  sens, 
chan  de  vos  lenga  romana; 
quar  nulhs  horn  justz  ni  peccaire 
de  vos  lauzar  nos  deu  traire, 
cum  sos  sens  mielhs  1'aparelha, 
romans  o  lenga  latina." 

The  next  six  stanzas,  all  beginning  with  "Domna,"  retain  these 
rhymes,  line  for  line ;  the  poem  closes  thus : 

"Domna,  esposa  filh'  e  maire, 
mandal  filh  e  pregal  paire, 
ab  1'espos  parP  e  conselha, 
com  merces  nos  si'aizina. 


END-RHYME  53 

"Nos  dormem,  mas  tuns  revelha 
ans  quens  sia  mortz  vezina."  1 

French  end-rhyme  —  naturally  resembling  both  Proven9al 
and  Italian  —  began  sweetly  with  the  famous  Cantilene  de  Sainte 
Eulalie,  the  first  extant  specimen  of  French  verse;  a  curiously 
isolated  thing,  belonging  near  the  end  of  the  ninth  century.  In  it 
about  half  the  rhymes  are  assonances  and  half  are  end-rhymes : 

"Buona  pulcella  fut  Eulalia, 
bel  auret  corps,  bellezour  anima. 

Voldrent  la  veintre  li  deo  inimi, 
voldrent  la  faire  di'aule  servir. 

Elle  non  eskoltet  les  mals  conseilliers, 
qu'elle  deo  raneiet,  chi  maent  sus  en  ciel, 

Ne  por  or  ned  argent  ne  paramenz, 
por  manatee  regiel  ne  preiement. 

N'iule  cose  non  la  pouret  omque  pleier, 
la  polle  sempre  non  amast  lo  deo  menestier. 

E  poro  fut  presentede  Maximilien, 
chi  rex  eret  a  eels  dis  sovre  pagiens. 

El  li  enortet,  dont  lei  nonque  chielt. 
qued  elle  fuiet  lo  nom  christiien. 

Ell'  eut  adunet  lo  suon  element, 
melz  sostendreiet  les  empedementz, 

Qu'elle  perdesse  sa  virginitet : 
poros  furet  morte  a  grand  honestet. 

Enz  enl  fou  la  getterent,  com  arde  tost, 
elle  colpes  non  auret,  poro  nos  coist. 

A  ezo  nos  voldret  concreidre  li  rex  pagiens; 
ad  une  spede  li  roveret  tolir  lo  chief. 

La  domnizelle  celle  kose  non  contredist, 
volt  lo  seule  lazsier,  si  ruovet  Krist. 

In  figure  de  colomb  volat  a  ciel, 
tuit  ovem,  que  por  nos  degnet  preier, 

Qued  auuisset  de  nos  Christus  mercit 
post  la  mort  et  a  lui  nos  laist  venir 

Par  souue  dementia." 

These  end-rhymed  or  assonanced  couplets  led  the  way,  after  a 
considerable  interval,  for  a  long  series  of  early  French  lyrics  and 
romances,  which  were  sung  and  recited  far  and  wide,  and  which 
both  popularized  and  disseminated  the  new  Romance  measures. 
By  the  twelfth  century  French  poetry  was  as  regularly  and 
smoothly  end-rhymed  as  any  early  verse,  in  which,  of  course, 

1  Karl  Bartsh:  Chrestomathie  Provengale,  207.  —  Elberfeld,  1868. 


54  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

irregularity  depended  on  the  incompetence  of  the  versifier;  for 
balladists,  in  every  land  and  time,  are  satisfied  with  assonance. 
Mono-rhyme,  as  in  Provenfal,  for  a  time,  was  deemed  a  peculiar 
merit.  Then  came  the  fanciful  array  —  so  well  befitting  the 
French  language  and  so  ill  the  English  —  of  the  ballade,  chant- 
royal,  triolet,  rondeau,  rondel,  virelai,  sextine,  pantoum,  villa- 
nelle.  From  the  days  of  Chaucer  to  those  of  Dobson,  not  all  the 
ingenuity  of  English  verse-wrights  has  succeeded  in  giving  any 
one  of  them  an  indispensable  place  in  the  British  anthology.  Of 
all  that  English  can  show  in  its  attempts  to  popularize  these 
forms,  two  of  the  best  are  separated  by  five  centuries :  Chaucer's 
Ballade  to  his  Lady  and  Dobson's  The  Ladies  of  St.  James's. 

In  the  ballade,  whatever  the  number  of  syllables  in  the  line  or 
the  number  of  lines  in  the  stanza  (from  eight  to  twelve),  the 
stanzas  must  follow  the  same  rhyme-order ;  each  stanza,  and  the 
four-lined  "envoi"  at  the  close  of  the  poem,  ending  with  the  same 
line.  The  ababbcbc  system  of  the  eight-line  stanza  and  the 
ababbccdcd  system  of  the  ten-line  stanza  give  something  of  the 
effect  of  both  Chaucer's  ababbcc  Troilus  and  Cressida  stanza  and 
the  Spenserian  ababbcbcc  stanza;  while  the  refrain  makes  its 
usual  impression. 

The  chant-royal  is  a  ballade  with  five  eleven-lined  stanzas, 
and  an  envoy,  the  normal  rhyme-scheme  of  the  stanzas  being 
ababccddede,  and  of  the  envoy  ddede  —  only  five  rhymes  for  sixty 
lines.  Rhyme-royal  is  of  course  a  different  and  much  simpler 
thing :  a  seven-line  stanza,  iambic  pentameter,  rhymed  ababbcc. 

The  triolet  has  eight  lines,  with  two  rhymes,  abaaabab;  the 
first,  fourth,  and  seventh  lines  being  identical,  and  the  second  and 
eighth.  It  has  all  of  the  demerits  and  none  of  the  merits  of 
iteration.1 

1  Edmund  Gosse  has  called  the  notice  of  readers  to  the  following 
elementary  triolet  by  Henri  de  Cray  (thirteenth  century) : 

"Je  Bois; 

Si  Je  fT' 

Ne  Vois, 
Je  Bois." 

Since  then  the  little  business  of  manufacture  has  been  simple  enough  ; 
for,  according  to  the  late  W.  E.  Henley, 
"Easy  is  the  triolet 
If  you  really  learn  to  make  it  1 


END-RHYME  55 

The  rondeau  and  rondel,  of  varying  structure,  always  repeat 
the  opening  words  in  the  middle  (roughly)  and  at  the  end. 

The  virelai,  still  freer  in  structure,  rhymes  the  longer  lines  with 
the  longer  and  the  shorter  with  the  shorter,  in  the  first  stanza, 
this  arrangement  being  shifted  in  the  next  stanza,  in  which  the 
long-line  rhymes  are  dropped  (to  reappear  in  the  last  stanza), 
and  the  short-line  rhymes  transferred  to  the  long. 

In  the  sextine,  or  sestina,  there  are  no  rhymes,  but  the  six  end- 
words  of  the  first  six-lined  stanza  are  repeated  in  the  five  subse- 
quent stanzas,  in  variant  ways;  while  in  a  closing  three-line 
stanza  half  of  the  end-words  are  given  in  the  middles  of  the  lines 
and  half  at  the  ends.  The  result  of  this  clever  intricacy,  when 
transferred  to  English,  is  hardly  distinguishable  from  blank-verse. 

The  pantoum  ingeniously  combines  all  the  faults  of  both  the 
virelai  and  the  sextine  by  an  interminable  number  of  four-line 
stanzas,  in  which  the  second  and  fourth  lines  of  the  first  stanza,  of 
but  four  lines,  become  the  first  and  third  of  the  next,  and  so  on, 
the  first  and  third  lines  of  the  first  stanza  reappearing  as  the 
second  and  fourth  of  the  closing  one. 

The  villanelle,  in  five  three-line  stanzas  and  a  four-line  con- 
clusion, has  but  two  rhymes,  arranged  aba  and  abaa.  Further- 
more, lines  1,  6, 12,  and  18  are  identical,  and  lines  3,  9, 15,  and  19. 
This,  like  the  great  terza  rima  itself,  nearly  destroys  any  stanza- 
effect  on  the  English  ear. 

French  poetry,  in  its  essential  principles  of  structure  and  ex- 
pression, differs  from  classical  verse  on  the  one  hand  and  modern 
Teutonic  on  the  other.  With  quantity  (time,  length,  stress)  it 
has  little  to  do.  Alliteration  is  usually  an  accident,  an  ornament, 
or  an  eccentricity.  French  scansion  depends  chiefly  upon  the 
count  of  syllables  in  the  line,  and  in  a  less  degree  upon  accent, 
which,  of  course,  exists  in  French,  but  not  in  the  English  or  Ger- 
man sense.  Such  a  line  as  Tennyson's  "Break !  break !  break  I" 
would  be  impossible  in  French,  nor  could  a  French  poet  pride 

Once  a  neat  refrain  you  get 

Easy  is  the  triolet. 

As  you  see  —  I  pay  my  debt 

With  another  rhyme.    Deuce  take  it. 

Easy  is  the  triolet 

If  you  really  leam  to  make  it  1" 


56  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

himself,  like  Coleridge,  upon  having,  in  a  poem  with  four  stresses 
in  each  line,  four  syllables  in  some  lines  and  thirteen  in  others. 
Of  the  "foot"  as  determined  by  intensity  of  stress,  French  hardly 
knows  anything;  trochee  and  iambus  have  little  relativity  to 
the  French  line;  indeed,  these  terms,  though  used  by  the  older 
French  prosodists  in  the  classical  period,  are  generally  ignored  by 
modern  authorities,  as  having  small  significance. 

Mitford  thought  French  the  poorest  of  languages  in  harmony, 
and  incapable  of  constituting  measure  save  by  numbering  sylla- 
bles, or  of  indicating  measure  save  by  rhyme  and  pause,  rhyme 
being  "the  powerful  and  almost  only  indicant  of  measure  in 
French  verse."  To  Poe  the  French  heroic  was  "the  most  wretch- 
edly monotonous  verse  in  existence."  The  French  language,  he 
went  on  to  say,  is  "without  accentuation  and  consequently  with- 
out verse." 

Profoundly  as  French  poetry  has  been  influenced  by  the  clas- 
sical spirit,  the  forms  of  classical  verse  become  mere  shadows  when 
imitated  in  French.  Indeed,  the  syllable  itself  is  sometimes  called 
the  foot.  In  the  all-prevalent  alexandrine  one  has  to  think  of  the 
twelve  syllables  rather  than  of  any  six  stresses,  with  a  strong 
caesura,  as  in  English.  Rhyme  of  some  sort  is  therefore  an  essen- 
tial of  French  poetry,  in  which  blank  verse  can  hardly  be  made 
distinguishable  from  good  prose.1 

Assonance  was  satisfactory  to  the  hearers  of  the  Chanson  de 
Roland,  and,  indeed,  was  so  accordant  with  the  genius  of  the 

1  If  an  accumulation  of  metaphors  may  be  taken  as  an  adequate 
expression  of  indebtedness,  certainly  Sainte-Beuve's  address  to  Rhyme 
is  a  sufficient  acknowledgment  of  its  service  to  the  French  language : 

"Rime,  qui  donnes  leurs  sons 

Aux  chansons, 
Rime,  1'unique  harmonic 
Du  vers,  qui,  sans  tes  accents 

Fremissants, 
Serait  muet  au  g4nie ; " 

and  so  on  through  seven  more  stanzas.  A  recent  critic  (Edmund 
Wright,  in  The  Contemporary  Review)  says  flatly  that  "French  blank 
verse  is  not  verse  at  all,  as  M.  Maeterlinck  and  other  modern  experi- 
menters in  new  rhythms  have  sadly  discovered.  The  unstable  French 
accents  cannot  by  themselves,  however  skilfully  they  are  placed,  give  to 
French  poetry  the  structure  which  distinguishes  it  from  prose.  The 
fetters  of  rhyme  are  necessary  to  this  end." 


END-RHYME  57 

language  that  it  might  naturally  have  survived  longer  than  was 
the  case,  had  it  not  lacked  the  regular  place-emphasis  of  its  suc- 
cessor end-rhyme. 

Consonance,  in  French  verse,  is  the  identity  of  consonants 
following  the  tonic  (in  English  the  accented)  vowel  —  thus, 
mille :  belle.  It  is,  for  consonants,  what  assonance  is  for  vowels. 
But  even  the  French  ear  hardly  distinguishes  the  two;  and  in 
English,  where  the  thought  rests  on  the  stressed  vowel,  conso- 
nance, thus  defined,  seems  merely  like  an  end-rhyme  that  is 
slightly  less  imperfect  than  ordinary  assonance.  Indeed,  con- 
sonance, in  English,  is  a  term  of  such  wandering  meaning  as  to  be 
useless ;  some  writers  make  it  synonymous  with  assonance,  and 
Puttenham  with  end-rhyme. 

The  rime  riche  of  French  —  amant:  charmant;  sommeil: 
vermeil;  orages:  courages;  etc. — is  now  scarcely  allowable  in 
English,  though  entirely  satisfactory  to  the  French  ear.1  The 
rime  superfine  (offense'e :  pensee)  carries  identity  of  spelling  back 
of  the  final  syllable;  though  here  French,  of  course,  has  no 
penultimate  rhyming  accent. 

As  regards  "eye-rhymes,"  French  and  English  are  not  unlike: 
—  cacher :  cher  is  no  more  allowable  in  the  one  tongue  than 
tough :  though  in  the  other.  But  the  French  rather  dislike  alliez : 
ecoliers,  as  the  English  hardly  sanction  rotten :  cotton.  In  some 
cases  the  usages  of  the  two  languages  are  squarely  opposite ;  thus 
French  forbids  aimer :  danger,  but  sanctions  danger :  songer. 
French  retains  the  permissibility  of  rhymes  between  identical 
words  with  entirely  different  meanings ;  thus  pas  (negative) : 
pas  (step) ;  porte  (gate) :  porte  (carries),  etc.,  —  a  practice  dis- 
continued in  English  hundreds  of  years  ago.  One  language,  or 
one  time,  regards  a  contrast  as  agreeable  which  is  intolerable  to 
another  language  or  time. 

Rhyme,  in  French,  being  more  necessary  than  in  other  lan- 
guages to  distinguish  verse  from  verse,  is  less  frequently  accom- 
panied by  the  enjambement  or  completion  of  the  phrase  in  a  second 
line.  Meaning,  accent,  and  rhyme  must  usually  coincide,  even 
in  English ;  in  French  they  are  seldom  separated  in  the  lines  of 
the  classical  drama.  With  the  advent  of  the  romantic  school, 
1  Compare  page  78. 


58  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

runover  lines  multiplied,  as  giving  a  sense  of  freedom;  just  as 
they  increased  in  English  when  the  formal  couplets  of  Pope  gave 
way  to  the  liberty  of  the  Wordsworth-Coleridge  school. 

Masculine  and  feminine  rhymes  in  French  are  used  more 
strictly  and  labelled  more  carefully  than  in  English,  though  most 
of  the  effects  secured  in  French  are  attainable  in  English.  The 
only  possible  feminine  rhyme  in  French  is  where  the  line  ends  in 
mute  e.  In  rimes  plates,  or  suivies,  two  feminine  rhymes  alter- 
nate with  two  masculine;  "in  strict  classical  plays  this  sequence 
is  not  broken  even  at  the  end  of  a  scene  or  act."  1  Rimes 
croisees  are  simply  alternations  of  feminines  and  masculines; 
embrassees  the  inclusion  of  two  feminines  between  two  mascu- 
lines, or  vice  versa.  In  English  such  variations  are  not  deemed 
sufficiently  noticeable  to  deserve  titles;  a  fact  which  shows 
the  greater  dependence  upon  rhyme  in  French. 

Rimes  melees,  resulting  in  vers  libres,  are  those  in  which  mascu- 
line and  feminine  rhymes  occur  as  the  poet's  wish  may  dictate. 
Vers  libres,  when  the  term  is  transferred  to  English,  would  more 
readily  suggest  lines  of  Whitman.  But  even  in  this  free  verse  of 
the  French,  adjoining  masculine  or  feminine  rhyme-words  must 
rhyme  together,  and  any  given  rhyme  cannot  be  repeated  more 
than  three  successive  times,  —  the  very  reverse  of  the  system 
originally  imposed  by  the  Proven9al  poets. 

Another  device  is  the  rime  fraternisee,  in  which  the  last  syllable 
of  a  line  is  repeated,  in  sound  or  in  identity,  as  the  first  of  the 
next  line.  Such  repetition  is  rather  common  in  English  as  an 
occasional  device  for  emphasis,  in  a  particular  case;  but  when 
carried  through  a  poem  becomes  very  tedious.2 

Whether,  as  some  claim,  the  French  is  peculiarly  the  precision- 
language  of  the  world,  it  is  certain  that  its  lack  of  strong  rhythm 
is  largely  compensated  by  the  extraordinary  poetic  beauty  of 
many  of  its  words,  considered  as  thought-symbols.  What  can  be 
more  mellifluous  and  also  suggestive  than 

"L'ombre  passe  et  repasse, 
Sans  repasser  1'homme  passe"? 

1  A  Companion  to  French  Verse,  by  H.  J.  Chaytor,  28. 
8  See  citations  in  French  and  English,  in  C.  Alphonso  Smith's  Repeti- 
tion and  Parettdism  in  English  Verse,  23-25. 


END-RHYME  59 

The  late  appearance  of  end-rhyme  in  Italian  is  to  be  ex- 
plained by  the  dominance  of  Latin  on  its  parent  soil.  A  long 
essay  might  be  written,  not  on  the  beneficence  of  classical  Latin- 
ity  all  through  the  Middle  Ages,  unquestionable  as  it  was,  but  on 
the  baneful  effect  of  Latin  upon  the  very  tongues  it  most  influ- 
enced, —  because  of  its  ancient  and  long-continuing  superiority 
and  their  self-admitted  inferiority.  Dante  wrote  an  apologia  for 
using  the  vulgar  tongue ;  Bacon  thought  to  save  his  really  valu- 
able works  by  putting  them  into  the  permanence  of  the  world- 
language;  Milton,  who  has  left  on  record  his  despite  of  rhyme, 
employed  Latin  as  a  superior  means  of  expression;  Gray  used 
English  and  Latin  indifferently;  and  Walter  Savage  Landor, 
who  died  as  late  as  1864,  preferred  the  ancient  vehicle  for  some 
of  his  poems. 

There  was  no  Italian  poetry,  save  in  Latin,  before  the  time  in 
which  Proven9al  —  that  connecting  link  between  French  and 
Italian  —  had  produced  a  definitely  developed  verse.  Proven- 
cal escaped  the  ban  of  provinciality  because  it  was  farther  away 
from  Italy  and  less  under  Latin  influence.  "The  Proven9al 
poets,"  says  Richard  Garnett,  in  his  History  of  Italian  Litera- 
ture, "  allowed  themselves  to  be  seduced  by  their  language's  un- 
equalled facilities  for  rhyming  into  an  idolatry  of  the  elaborate, 
which  offered  great  impediments  to  the  simple  expression  of 
feeling.  Some  of  their  strophes  contain  no  fewer  than  twenty- 
eight  verses,  the  same  set  of  rhymes  being  carried  through  the 
whole  stanza,  and  very  frequently  through  the  entire  poem.  .  .  . 
It  was  fortunate  for  the  Italians  that  their  language,  fluent  and 
supple  as  it  is,  is  incapable  of  such  feats,  and  that,  while  adopt- 
ing their  lyrical  measures  from  the  Prove^als,  they  could  not, 
had  they  wished,  cramp  themselves  by  the  reproduction  of  the 
latter' s  tours-de-force."  Yet,  as  will  immediately  be  seen,  Dr. 
Garnett's  statement  goes  too  far ;  for  some  of  the  earliest  Italian 
rhymers  sedulously  attempted  the  same  thing. 

The  discussions  as  to  whether  there  was  a  body  of  early  popu- 
lar poetry  which  is  entirely  lost ;  or  whether  Sicily  or  Italy  was 
first  in  the  poetical  field ;  or  whether  the  earliest  Sicilian  *  poems 

1  The  term  "Sicilian"  in  this  connection  is  generally  used  by  scholars 
to  signify  not  only  the  island  of  Sicily,  but  also  southern  Italy. 


60  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

were  written  in  a  Sicilian  dialect  transcribed  into  Tuscan,  or,  as 
Dante  seems  to  have  thought,  written  in  a  purer  Sicilian  form ; 
or  whether  the  earliest  verse  was  literary,  popular,  or  religious,  do 
not  concern  us  here.  For  us  the  question  is  simply:  When  did 
end-rhyme  appear  in  the  volgare?  Clearly  it  began  at  once,  be- 
ing practically  universal,  and  used  with  much  precision,  as  was 
natural  under  Proven9al  influence.  Blank  verse  was  of  late  date, 
and  never  commonly  used,  Trissino,  who  is  chiefly  known  for 
his  effort  to  introduce  it  in  the  late  Renaissance,  having  failed  in 
his  purpose. 

Perhaps  the  oldest  piece  of  end-rhyme  with  a  known  date  is  an 
inscription  in  the  Duomo  of  Ferrara,  of  1135.  It  was  destroyed 
by  an  earthquake,  and  survives  in  a  copy,  which  I  quote  from 
Monaci's  Crestomazia  italiana  del  Primi  Secoli  (Citta  di  Cas- 
tello,  1889),  9: 

"Li  mile  cento  trenta  cenqe  nato, 
fo  questo  templo  a  San  Gogio  donate 
da  Glelmo  ciptadin  per  so  amore, 
e  mea  fo  1  'opra  Nicolao  scolptore." 

Then,  as  in  French  three  centuries  before,  came  a  Cantilena. 
Here,  as  in  Provenfal,  success  in  rhyme  was  supposed  to  depend 
upon  cumulation;  in  the  first  twenty-four  lines,  cited  below, 
there  are  but  two  rhymes,  while  in  the  remaining  sixteen  there  are 
two  more;  —  the  greater  number  of  rhymes,  however  forced, 
one  could  find  for  the  same  word,  the  better  poet  he  was.  This 
fetter,  however,  was  speedily  dropped  in  Italian : 

"Salva  lo  vescovo  sanato, 
lo  mellior  c'umque  sia  nato ; 
ke  da  1'ora  fue  sagrato 
tutt'  allumina  '1  cericato. 
ne  fisolaco  n&  Cato 
non  fue  si  ringratiato. 

el  papa  '1  su 

per  suo  drudo  plu  private. 

suo  gentile  vescovato 

ben  e  cresciuto  e  melliorato. 

L'  apostolico  romano, 
1'  ...  laterano, 
san  Benedetto  e  san  Germane 
'1  destine  d'esser  sovrano 
de  tutto  regno  cristiano; 


END-RHYME  61 

peroe  vene  da  Lornano, 
del  paradis  dil  Viano. 
Sa  non  fue  questo  villano, 
da  ce  '1  mondo  fue  pagano 
non  ci  so  tal  marchisciano. 
se  mi  da  caval  balgano, 
monsterroll'  al  bon  Galgano, 
al  vescovo  volterrano, 
cui  bendicente  bacio  la  mano."  1 

The  uncertain  borderland  between  "pure"  and  "Italian" 
Proven9al  is  shown  by  the  appearance  in  Monaci's  Crestomazia, 
as  well  as  in  the  Proven9al  collections,  of  the  Contrasto  of  Ram- 
baldo  de  Vaqueiras  (end  of  the  twelfth  century),  in  fourteen- 
line  stanzas,  the  first,  in  which  the  lover  speaks,  being  in  Pro- 
venfal,  and  the  next,  the  lady's  reply,  in  Italian,  and  so  on 
throughout  —  masculine  and  feminine  rhymes  appearing  in- 
differently.2 To  the  same  period  Monaci  assigns  four-rhymed 
verses  in  the  vernacular,  introduced  into  a  Latin  chronicle  as  a 
comment  thereon.  The  assonance  in  the  first  two  lines  will  be 
noticed : 

"De  Casteldard  havi  li  nostri  bona  part 
i  lo  zetta  totto  intro  lo  flumo  d'Ard, 
e  sex  cavaler  de  Tarvis  li  plui  fer 
con  se  duse  li  nostri  cavaler."  3 

About  1224  came  a  song  traditionally  assigned  to  St.  Francis  of 
Assisi,  said  to  have  been  uttered  by  him  and  recorded  by  one 
of  his  followers.  It  is  a  paraphrase  of  Psalm  cxlviii,  in  a  sort  of 
rhythmic  prose,  assonanced  and  rhymed,  assonance  predominat- 
ing.4 Alliteration  found  a  slight  and  almost  indistinguishable 
place  in  the  intricate  obscurities  of  the  pre-Dantesque  poets. 

The  oldest  specimen  given  in  Giosue  Carducci's  Primavera  e 
Fiore  delta  Lirica  Italiana  (Florence :  2  vols.,  1903)  is  an  address 
to  a  lady,  by  Federico  II  (1194-1250),  king  of  Naples  and  Sicily, 
perfectly  rhymed  abbcdabdcddeefdeef.5  This  poem  Carducci  ap- 
parently considers  the  first  piece  of  pure  literature  among  Italian 
lyrics. 

It  is  to  be  noted  that  the  Southern  poets  were  never  so  artificial 

1  Crestomazia,  9.          3  Crestomazia,  14-15.        *  Crestomazia,  15-16. 
4  Crestomazia,  29-31.  6  See  page  35. 


62  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

in  form  as  the  Northern,  though,  to  take  a  single  example,  Gia- 
como  da  Lentino,  who  was  a  contemporary  of  Federico  II,  wrote 
sonnets  interesting  for  their  repetition  of  the  same  rhyme-word 
(Proven9al  "replication"),  sometimes  with  the  same  meaning, 
sometimes  not.  In  one,  only  two  rhymes  are  used:  viso  and 
visare;  while  the  root  is  constantly  repeated: 

"Lo  viso  e  son  diviso  da  lo  viso,"  etc.1 

Then  there  were  the  usual  punning  verses,  depending  upon  simi- 
larities of  sound,  such  as  amore  and  amaro,  etc.  More  distinctly 
Italian  than  Proven9al  were  such  repetitions  as  those  of  Puccian- 
done  Martelli  of  Pisa : 

"Similemente  gente  criatura, 
La  portatura  pura  ed  awenente 
Faite  plagente  mente  per  natura, 
Si  che'n  altura  cura  vo'  la  gente,"  etc.8 

Such  trickery,  of  course,  with  its  substitution  of  sound  for  sense, 
could  make  no  lasting  place  for  itself. 

Guittone  d'Arezzo  (born  about  1230)  was  especially  noted  for 
his  wilful  artificiality  and  obscurity  in  forced  rhyming.  His  con- 
temporaries Guido  Guinicelli  and  Guido  Cavalcanti  (both  of 
the  middle  of  the  thirteenth  century)  are  much  more  normal, 
while,  as  a  rule,  the  poems  of  Cino  da  Pistoia  (1270-1326),  the 
contemporary  and  friend  of  Dante,  show  perfect  and  regular 
rhyme.  Thus  was  prepared  the  way  for  Dante. 

That  great  poet  well  knew  the  intricate  rhyming  devices  of  his 
time,  and  prided  himself  on  his  power  over  them.  In  the  De 
Vulgari  Eloquentia  he  devoted  a  chapter  to  "the  Relation  of  the 
Rhymes,  and  in  what  Order  they  are  to  be  placed  in  the  Stanza." 
After  alluding  to  Arnauld  Daniel's  "unrhymed  stanza,  in  which 
there  is  no  question  of  the  arrangement  of  rhymes,"  he  adds: 
"And  we  have  said 

'  Al  poco  giorno  ed  al  gran  cerchio  d'ombra.' " 

That  is,  Dante  reminded  his  readers  that  he  himself  had  written 
at  least  one  poem  without  rhyme.  But  though  that  poem  had  no 

1  Crestomazia,  55. 

3  Gaspary's  History  of  Early  Italian  Literature,  79. 


END-RHYME  63 

technical  end-rhyme,  each  stanza  made  use  of  the  same  terminal 
words,  in  rearranged  order,  forming  a  sestina,  or  sestine. 
Then,  in  his  discussion,  Dante  passes  from  mono-rhymes  to 
mixed  rhymes,  which  offer  the  fullest  license,  on  which  "the 
sweetness  of  the  whole  harmony  chiefly  results."  Rhyming  the 
first  line  of  the  latter  part  of  the  stanza  with  the  ending  of  the 
last  line  of  the  former  part  "appears  to  be  nothing  else  but  a  kind 
of  beautiful  linking  together  of  the  whole  stanza."  While  al- 
lowing "every  suitable  license"  to  "the  arrangement  of  rhymes 
according  as  they  are  in  the  Fronte  or  Coda,"  "still  the  endings 
of  the  last  lines  will  be  most  beautiful  if  they  fall  with  a  rhyme 
into  silence."  The  terza  rima,  as  such,  is  not  discussed  at  length, 
but  he  duly  considers  cases  where,  in  a  group  of  lines  of  uneven 
number,  a  line  must  be  cared  for  by  an  accompanying  rhyme 
in  another  division.  Things  to  be  avoided  are  (1)  "excessive 
repetition  of  the  same  rhyme,"  save  as  "something  new  and  before 
unattempted  in  the  art  [novum  aliquod  atque  intentatum  artis]" 
of  the  canzone,  which  "we  appear  to  have  achieved  in  the  can- 
zone beginning  'Amor  tu  vedi  che  questa  donna'  ";  (2)  "that 
useless  ambiguity  which  always  seems  to  detract  somewhat  from 
the  subject" ;  and  (3)  "roughness  of  rhymes,  unless  it  be  mingled 
with  smoothness,  for  the  Tragedy  itself  gains  brilliancy  from  the 
mixture  of  smooth  and  rough  rhymes."  1 

Dante  at  least  once  divided  a  word  at  the  end  of  a  rhyming 
line  —  differente-mente  (Paradiso,  XXIV,  16),  where,  curiously 
enough,  the  halves  of  the  word  rhyme.  His  rhyming  Cristo: 
Cristo  was  perhaps  an  indication  that  he  thought  the  word  too 
sacred  for  any  other  companion.  In  only  two  other  cases  does 
he  rhyme  identical  words  with  the  same  sense.  Purgatorio,  XX, 
65,  67,  69,  ammenda;  and  Paradiso,  XXX,  95,  97,  99,  vidi. 

In  Dante's  opinion  rhyme  was  the  servant,  not  the  master.2 

1  A.  G.  Ferrers   HowelPs   translation,  80-4.     Gaspary  (History  of 
Early  Italian  Literature,  262)  expresses  the  opinion  that  in  the  canzone 
"Amor  tu"  "the1  subject-matter  is  entirely  lost  in  the  artificiality  of  the 
form." 

2  Professor  E.  A.  Fay,  in  his  Concordance  of  the  Divina  Commedia, 
notes  that   Dante  uses  as  rhymes  no  less  than  402  words  and  word- 
forms  more  or  less  unusual,  "not  including  the  numerous  instances 
of  the  substitution  of  the  verb-ending  e  for  i,  which,  except  with  the 
verb  sie,  Dante  makes  only  in  the  verse-ending."    Professor  Fay  also 


64  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

"I,  the  writer  [L'Ottimo  Comento,  Inferno,  X,  85,  cited  in  Long- 
fellow's translation]  heard  him  say  that  never  a  rhyme  had  led 
him  to  say  other  than  he  would,  but  that  many  a  time  and  oft  he 
had  made  words  say  in  his  rhymes  what  they  were  not  wont  to 
express  for  other  poets."  So,  under  his  hand,  the  Divina  Corn- 
media  became  the  first  monument  of  the  Italian  language,  the 
first  great  poem  of«the  Christian  world,  the  first  masterpiece  of 
modern  literature,  and  the  first  great  treasury  of  end-rhyme.  In 
Italian,  no  longer  mere  Tuscan,  all  subsequent  end-rhymers  were 
given  a  model  of  perfection.  "To  write  in  rhyme  in  the  vulgar 
is,  after  a  manner,  the  same  thing  as  to  write  in  verse  in  Latin. 
If  any  figure  or  rhetorical  coloring  is  allowed  to  [classical]  poets, 
it  is  also  allowed  to  the  rhymers,"  said  Dante  in  the  Vita  Nuova 
(XXV).  Never  was  a  great  literary  change  more  concisely  stated, 
by  one  who  had  every  right  to  speak. 

In  Italian  poetry,  as  the  language  demands,  the  feminine  end- 
ing is  the  rule  and  the  masculine  the  exception.  Masculine  rhyme 
is  most  frequently  used  by  truncation;  thus  mare  becomes  mar; 
sole,  sol;  stare,  star,  etc.  A  few  words  once  feminine  are  now 
masculine  (always  with  a),  as  cittate,  citta;  pietate,  pietA;  cari- 
tate,  carita.  Similarly  available  for  poetic  use  as  masculine 
rhymes  are  some  verb-forms,  such  as  accostera,  andra,  trovera 
(future),  or  trovb,  vende,  servl  (preterite).  Among  monosyllabic 
verb-forms  are  e,  fu,  da,  sta,  do,  fo,  etc.  Other  monosyllabic 
words  are  dl,  re  (nouns) ;  mi,  si,  me,  se,  te  (pronouns) ;  ll  (adverb). 

Thus  masculine  rhymes  appear  all  the  way  from  the  thirteenth 
to  the  twentieth  century,  when  Carducci  used  them  effectively. 
They  are  more  frequent  in  popular  and  religious  verse  than  in 
the  more  literary  forms.  Dante  used  them  sparingly,  there  being 
only  twenty-eight  in  the  whole  of  the  Divina  Commedia. 

In  Lo  Splanamento  dei  proverbj  di  Salomone,  per  Maestro 
Girardo  Patecchio  da  Cremona  (thirteenth  century) 1  are  such 

makes  the  interesting  point  that,  of  the  93  words  used  only  by  Dante, 
75  are  found  only  in  the  verse-ending.  Of  the  93,  62  are  in  the  Paradiso, 
because,  he  thinks,  of  the  necessarily  greater  number  of  philosophical 
and  theological  terms,  the  inclination  to  portray  the  higher  glories  by 
unusual  words,  and  the  fact  that  Dante,  "after  he  had  been  crowned  and 
mitred  lord  of  himself,  .  .  .  felt  freer  than  before  to  choose  and  coin  the 
words  his  subject  or  his  rhyme  demanded." 
1  Crestomazia,  101-3. 


END-RHYME  65 

rhymes  as  rason:  Salamon;  mendar :  omiliar ;  de:le;  mal:val; 
da :  fara  ;  tant :  favelant ;  mescladament :  cent. 

In  the  song  Ogni  giorno  tu  mi  di  (fifteenth  century)1  the  rhymes 
are  entirely  masculine,  with  the  recurrent  refrain  of  the  title-line. 

Many  other  illustrations  may  be  found  in  fourteenth  and  fif- 
teenth century  verse.  Thus  in  the  Lirica  Italiana  antica,  "Fatti 
inderiera,  non  t'acostare  in  za"  (p.  105;  fourteenth  century)  has 
za :  ilia :  fa' :  m'a :  da :  acostera :  za  ;  acosterb :  t'ubbidirb  ;  mi :  ti  : 
si;  f£:e:re;  piu:  tu.  In  "Giu  per  la  mala  via"  (p.  121;  fif- 
teenth century)  are  va :  sara :  falsita :  ha :  iniquita :  aiutera :  da  : 
fa:  sta:  dara:  fara:  volonta:  adversita,  and  so  on,  in  thirteen 
more  a  rhymes.  This  use  of  mono-rhyme  also  appears  in  thir- 
teen e  rhymes  in  "La  charitad  e  spenta"  (p.  147;  fifteenth  cen- 
tury) ;  but  in  this  case  some  words  are  repeated,  as  in  the  ron- 
deau and  similar  poems.  I  rhymes  are  carried  through  the  poem 
(pp.  254-5;  fifteenth  century)  taking  its  title  from  its  refrain  "Se 
mi  dicessi,  di'." 

Rhythm  or  rhyme,  in  any  language,  must  frequently  modify 
the  usual  accents.  Thus  in  English,  even  such  a  word  as  "water" 
is  either  water,  as  in  prose,  or  wate"r,  as  in  Rossetti  and  other 
medisevally-inclined  poets.  Proper  names  in  English,  however, 
are  invariable.  But  in  the  earliest  Italian  poetry  great  freedom 
was  taken,  of  which  a  full  account  is  given  in  Dr.  C.  N.  Caix's 
study  of  Le  Origini  della  Lingua  Poetica  Italiana  (Florence, 
1880),  pp.  193-6.  "The  exigencies  of  rhythm  and  of  rhyme," 
says  Dr.  Caix,  "caused  frequent  anomalies  in  the  accent, 
whereby  it  was  now  thrown  backward,  now  forward.  Formerly  in 
Latin  the  vowel  quantity  was  free  within  certain  limits  in  the 
positio  debilis,  and  the  same  liberty  naturally  remained  to  the 
Italian  poets;  thus  tenebre,  penetro,  side  by  side  with  tenebre, 
penetro,  and  the  like,  are  still  in  poetic  use.  But  in  other  cases  the 
poetic  accent  is  not  less  opposed  to  the  Latin  use  than  to  the 
popular  Italian  use.  Thus,  to  cite  but  a  few  of  his  examples,  he 
gives  onesta,  liberta,  and  pieta,  instead  of  onesta,  etc.,  among 
common  nouns ;  while  for  proper  nouns,  he  notes  that  "the  poets 
continued  to  follow,  in  names  of  mythological  origin,  the  French 
accent  with  much  greater  frequency  when  these  names  were  less 

1  Lirica  Italiana  antica,  per  Eugenia  Levi.     Florence,  1905,  190. 

5 


66  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

popular  and  they  could  change  the  accent  in  the  service  of  har- 
mony or  rhyme,  without  running  against  custom."  Thus  in 
Dante:  Naidde,  Eti6pe,  Pisistrdto,  Etedcle,  Ardbi,  Climene, 
Lete,  Satdn,  Polinestar,  Paris,  etc.,  and  in  Petrarch:  Alcibidde, 
Penelope,  Cleomenes,  Annibdl,  etc. 

The  accent  may  be  pushed  forward  in  adjectives,  timile  be- 
coming umile,  simile,  simile,  etc. 

Dr.  Caix  also  shows  that  in  the  Poema  dell'  Intelligenza  such 
verb-endings  as  the  third  person  plural  of  the  imperfect  were  ac- 
cented for  the  sake  of  rhyme,  -edno,  idno;  while  in  the  same 
poem  when  they  are  not  rhyme-words  they  are  given  the  normal 
accent,  -eano,  -iano. 

Early  Italian  poets  also  changed  the  verb-endings  from  one 
conjugation  to  another;  thus  Dante  changed  schermire  (third 
conj.)  into  schermare  (first  conj.),  and  many  others  at  will,  most 
easily  turning  the  second  into  the  third  or  the  third  into  the  second. 
These  transfers  included  not  only  the  infinitive  but  also  the  par- 
ticipial and  personal  terminations.  Such  alterations  would,  of 
course,  be  possible  only  in  the  case  of  a  language  in  a  state  of 
formation. 

Other  changes  of  verb-spelling  for  the  sake  of  rhyme  are,  for 
instance,  aita  for  ajuta  (Le  Origini,  220-1). l 

This  is  not  the  place  for  an  extensive  history  of  Italian  rhyme ; 
as  in  the  case  of  other  languages  thus  far  considered,  those  points 
only  have  been  noted  which  have  borne  upon  the  general  study. 
Its  origins  in  Italy  were,  as  has  been  seen,  Latin  and  Proven9al ; 
but,  of  course,  the  usual  attempts  have  been  made  to  assign  its 
beginnings  to  the  Goths,  the  Huns,  or  what-not.  The  Goth-Hun 
fallacy,  the  predecessor  of  the  Arabian,  survived  as  late  as  Mit- 
ford's  time;  he  says  that  "Italian,  Spanish,  and  Romanesk 
.  .  .  were  compelled  to  depose  the  ruling  power  of  the  harmony 
of  their  parent  language,  and  receive  new  laws  of  verse  from  the 
Teutonic  conquerors."  But,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  Teutonic 
and  the  Romance  languages,  without  influence  the  one  upon  the 

1  In  all  phonetic  history,  we  find  vowels  freely  changing  into  similar 
vowels,  and  consonants  somewhat  less  freely  into  similar  consonants. 
The  exigencies  of  rhyme,  for  a  thousand  years,  have  continually, 
though  sporadically,  increased  this  tendency,  —  sometimes  in  the  line 
of  permanent  changes  in  orthography,  sometimes  not. 


END-RHYME  67 

other,  took  the  same  pleasure  in  adding  end-rhyme  for  the  sake 
of  new  enjoyment  in  stress,  and  so  reached  the  same  result. 

I  am  tempted  to  turn  to  the  modern  poets,  to  take  up  the  far- 
reaching  influence  of  the  Italian  sonnet,  or  to  study  the  details  of 
the  canzone,  the  sestina,  etc.,  but  must  take  space  for  nothing 
more  than  the  first,  and  the  last  two,  stanzas  of  the  triumphant 
tribute  to  rhyme  paid  by  the  latest  of  the  greater  Italian  singers 
—  himself,  in  his  Odi  Barbari,  a  "rebel"  against  it: 

"Ave,  o  rima !    Con  belle  arte 
Su  le  carte 

Te  persegue  il  trovadore; 
Ma  tu  brilli,  tu  scintilli, 
Tu  zampilli, 
Su  del  popolo  dal  cuore.  .  .  . 

"Ave,  o  bella  imperatrice, 
O  felice 

Del  latin  metro  reina ! 
Un  ribelle  ti  saluta 
Combattuta, 
E  a  te  libero  s'inclina. 

"Cura  e  onor  de'  padri  miei, 
Tu  mi  sei 

Come  lor  sacra  e  diletta. 
Ave,  o  rima :  e  dammi  un  fiore 
Per  1'amore, 
E  per  1'odio  una  saetta." 

In  German,  notwithstanding  the  primeval  vogue  of  allitera- 
tion, end-rhyme  appeared  early  in  the  famous  work  of  Otfried, 
who  finished  in  868  a  paraphrastic  translation  of  the  Gospels,  — 
the  earliest  piece  of  such  verse  in  the  language,  and  one  of  the  most 
valuable  monuments  of  Teutonic  speech.  Longfellow,  in  his 
Poets  and  Poetry  of  Europe,  as  late  as  1845,  spoke  of  it  as  having 
been  written  in  "Frankish,"  but  the  old  term,  used  from  Fau- 
chet's  time  for  more  than  two  centuries,  has  now  been  aban- 
doned for  the  more  proper  word. 

Otfried's  rhyme  is  irregular,  often  a  mere  similarity  of  sound, 
and  subordinate  to  rhythm,  —  as  in  Latin  end-rhyme,  and  in  the 
German  rhymers  immediately  following  him.  But  it  is  unmis- 
takable, as,  for  instance,  in  the  two  concluding  stanzas  of  his 
poem  in  praise  of  the  Franks : 


68  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

"Nu  freuuen  sih  es  alle 
So  uuer  so  uuola  uuolle 
Joh  so  uuer  si  hold  in  muate 
Francono  Thiote 

Thaz  uuir  kriste  sungun 
In  uusera  zungun. 
Joh  uuir  ouh  thaz  gilebetun 
In  frengiskon  nan  lobotun."  * 

Here,  at  first,  as  in  some  of  our  early  English  rhymed  ballads,  it 
makes  no  particular  difference  whether  the  line  be  regarded  as  one 
or  two,  —  one,  with  internal  rhyme,  or  two,  with  rhymes  at  the  end. 

Naturally,  such  early  rhyming  has  long  attracted  the  atten- 
tion of  scholars.  Fauchet  argues  that  Charlemagne  took  pleas- 
ure in  hearing  the  deeds  of  kings  recited  in  his  own  tongue,  and 
thinks  that  Eginhard  intimates  that  this  singing  was  in  rhyme. 
It  may  well  have  been,  he  says,  that  rhyme  was  in  use  in  Charle- 
magne's day,  even  in  vulgar  tongues,  such  was  the  vogue  of  ec- 
clesiastical Latin  hymns.  In  fact,  "ie  dy  qu'il  y  a  grande  appar- 
ence  que  nos  Franfois  ont  monstre  aux  autres  nations  d'Europe 
1'usage  de  la  ryme  consonante  ou  omioteleute,  ainsi  que  voudrez," 
for  the  Franks  overcame  the  Proven9als  and  the  Sicilians,  from 
whom  the  Italians  got  rhyme.  Joan  de  la  Enzina,  says  Fauchet, 
had  confessed  "que  la  ryme  est  passee  d'ltalie  en  Espagne." 
But  after  this  bit  of  guesswork,  so  similar  to  that  which  we  have 
in  our  own  day,  Fauchet  wisely  concludes  that  the  origin  of  rhyme 
is  "vne  si  grande  obscurite,"  "pour  laquelle  esclaircir  tant  de 
S£avans  hommes  d'ltalie  se  sont  iusques  icy  trauillee."  How- 
ever, "  Que  si  les  Proven9aux  veulent  dire  qu'ils  sont  autheurs  de 
la  ryme,  c'est  a  eux  a  monstrer  vn  tesmoinage  plus  ancien  que  la 
translation  qu'  Otfried  a  f aicte  des  Evangiles :  ou  que  leur  langue 
fut  en  prix  du  temps  de  Charles  le  Grand."  2 

1  "And  now  may  all  men  of  good  will  rejoice  and  be  content,  all 
those  of  the  Prankish  nation  who  have  a  right  heart ;  for  we  have  lived 
to  sing  Christ  in  the  tongue  of  our  fathers." 

2  Recoil  de  I  'Origine   de   la  Langve   et   Poesie  Franqoise,  Ryme  et 
Romans;  ch.  VII  —  Quand  la  Ryme,  telle  que  nous  1'avons,  commenga : 
&  que  les  Espagnoles  &  Italiens  1'ont  prise  des  Frangois.  —  Paris,  1581. 
— This  entire  chapter,  in  its  discussion  of  the  decline  of  classical  quantity, 
the  new  rhymed  rhythms  of  the  church,  and  north-European  pleasure 
in  strongly  stressed  similar  consonantal  sounds,  was  far  in  advance  of  the 
prevalent  English  criticism  of  the  time. 


END-RHYME  69 

A  good  deal  of  common  sense,  as  well  as  scholarship,  is  packed 
into  a  few  words  by  Professor  Francke  when  he  says : 

"The  very  fact  that  Otfried's  work—  'The  Book  of  the  Gos- 
pels in  the  Vernacular/  as  he  calls  it  himself,  —  is  known  as 
the  first  specimen  of  rhymed  verse  in  German  literature,  is  sig- 
nificant of  the  tendency  of  the  time.  Otfried's  personal  reason  for 
discarding  alliterative  verse  and  adopting  rhyme  in  its  stead  was 
his  hatred  of  what  he  calls  the  obscene  songs  of  the  laymen,  i.  e., 
the  popular  epic  ballads.  As  these  still  preserved  the  alliterative 
measure,  Otfried  could  not  have  marked  his  opposition  to  them 
more  effectively  than  by  introducing  a  poetical  form  hallowed 
by  the  example  of  the  great  hymn- writers  of  the  Latin  church. 
But  there  can  be  little  doubt  that  alliterative  verse  itself,  in  the 
middle  of  the  ninth  century,  had  already  begun  to  decay,  and  to 
lose  its  hold  upon  the  people  at  large.  Limited  as  it  was  to  the 
portrayal  of  a  primitive,  sturdy,  unreflective  life,  it  would  have 
given  way,  even  without  Otfried's  initiative,  to  a  poetic  form 
better  adapted  to  the  emotional,  reflective,  spiritual  state  of  mind 
which  now  was  in  the  ascendancy,  and  which  Otfried  himself 
so  well  represents."  * 

This  is  not  the  place  to  trace  the  history  of  German  rhyme 
down  through  the  Middle  Ages  to  Lessing's  day,  or  to  consider 
its  splendid  achievements  in  the  melodious  "Kennst  du  das 
Land"  period  of  Goethe,  Schiller,  Kbrner,  Riickert,  and  Heine. 
But  one  must  enter  a  caveat  against  the  curious  dictum  of  Pro- 
fessor Earle,  in  his  Philology  of  the  English  Tongue,  that  Ger- 
man has  a  better  command  of  "this  Romanesque  ornament" 
than  does  English,  because  German  has  more  inflectional  endings. 
Rhyme  may,  as  Earle  says,  be  naturally  at  home  in  inflected 
languages,  which  invite  it;  but  if  anybody  doubts  the  equality 
of  English  in  its  use,  let  him  read  through,  in  comparison  with 
German,  such  an  anthology  as  the  late  W.  E.  Henley's  English 
Lyrics:  Chaucer  to  Poe. 

Icelandic  rhyme,  as  we  have  seen,  was  and  is  mainly  allitera- 
tive ;  Vigf  usson  says  that  Icelanders  are  still  apt  in  improvisation, 
and  that  alliteration  is  to-day  necessary  to  please.  But  end-rhyme 
sporadically  appeared  in  the  work  of  Egil  Skallagrimsson,  in 
1  History  of  German  Literature,  41-2. 


70  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

the  tenth  century.  Perfect  rhyme,  in  Icelandic,  required  that 
two  of  the  syllables  in  the  same  verse  correspond  perfectly,  and 
half-rhyme  that  they  have  different  vowels  before  the  same  con- 
sonant or  combination  of  consonants.  In  Egil  four  or  eight 
verses  of  the  strophe  sometimes  had  the  same  rhyme.  The  divi- 
sions were  clear,  with  stanzas  and  burdens ;  but  rhyme  was  not 
regular,  and  Egil  had  no  immediate  followers.  Schipper's  con- 
jecture that  the  Anglo-Saxon  Rhyming  Poem  of  the  Codex  Ex- 
oniensis  may  have  been  produced  under  the  influence  of  Egil, 
who  was  twice  in  England,  must  remain  a  conjecture. 

A  bit  from  Egil's  Hofuft-Laum  (The  Head-Ransom)  will 
illustrate  his  end-rhyme,  even  to  those  unfamiliar  with  the 
language : 

"Vestr  f6r-ek  um  ver;  enn  ek  ViSriss  her 

mun-strandar  mar:  ^svd  es  mftt  of  far: 
Dr6-ek  eiki  d  flot  viS  Isa-brot, 

hloS  ek  mserCar  hlut  minniss  knorrar  skut. 
BuComk  hilmir  laoS.    Nu  &-ek  hr6ffrar  kvaoC; 

berr-ek  OSins  miaoS  a  Engla  biaoC: 
Lof  at  vfsa  vann ;  iaofur  maeri-ek  pann ; 

hliotfe  sesti-ek  hann,  es  ek  hroCr  of  fann."  * 

Another  rhyming  device,  suggestive  of  certain  measures  of  the 
English  poets  of  the  nineteenth  century,  is  thus  described  by 
Vigfusson  and  Powell:  "Einar,  late  in  the  tenth  century,  uses  a 
kind  of  echo  in  his  line,  making  the  first  stress  after  the  line-pause 
in  alliteration  and  consonance  with  the  last  stress  before  the  line- 
pause."  This  metre  is  called  idr-moelt,  iterative,  by  Snorri :  — 
"Hug  stdran  biS-ek  heyra:  heyr-iarl  kvasis  dreyra." 

I  may  remark  here,  once  more,  that  the  term  "consonance" 
has  not  sufficiently  established  itself  in  English  prosody  to  make 
its  use  desirable.  Take :  gate  are  assonance ;  took :  cake  conso- 
nance. One  minds  the  vowel,  the  other  the  consonant.  The 
later  "court-metrists"  of  Iceland  called  consonance  half-rhyme. 

1  "I  came  west  on  the  sea,  bearing  the  sea  of  Woden's  heart  [my 
song];  that  was  my  way.  I  launched  my  ship  afloat  from  Iceland,  I 
loaded  the  stern  of  my  mind-vessel  [my  breast]  with  a  cargo  of  praise. 
The  king  has  given  me  a  welcome.  I  owe  him  a  song  of  praise.  I  bring 
the  mead  of  Woden  into  England.  I  have  made  a  Song  of  Honor  on 
the  king ;  I  laud  that  prince.  I  ask  him  for  a  hearing  now  that  I  have 
devised  my  song  of  praise."  (Vigfusson  and  Powell's  translation.) 


END-RHYME  71 

• 

Icelandic  dance-songs,  at  the  end  of  the  eleventh  century, 
sometimes  consisted  of  rhyming  couplets,  one  line  sung  by  the 
man  and  the  other  by  the  woman.  It  was  usually  satirical  or 
amorous  —  in  the  latter  respect  not  wholly  unlike  some  Provenfal 
dawn-poems  or  old  English  ditties.  The  dance-songs  were  fre- 
quently non-alliterative,  say  Vigfusson  and  Powell;  but  "this 
lack  was  less  felt  because  they  were  sung  and  stepped  to,  the 
metre  being  thus  unmistakably  marked  out."  In  the  later  cen- 
turies came  popular  rhymes,  jingles,  and  ditties  of  every  sort: 
juvenile,  meteorological,  sententious,  religious;  of  animals; 
anagrams,  riddles,  etc. 

In  the  "court-metre"  (1150-1222),  in  each  alliterative  line 
were  two  sets  of  rhymes,  one  in  each  half-line.  A  foreign  (chiefly 
French)  influence  was  now  apparent.  The  first  regular  later  end- 
rhyme  is  in  the  Olafs-Rima  of  Einar  Gilsson,  about  1360. 
Thenceforward,  of  the  more  ambitious  verse,  there  was  a  continual 
succession  to  the  present  day  of  rhymed  poems  —  religious,  satiri- 
cal, historical,  and  romantic.  "Both  strict  alliteration  and  rhyme 
are  necessary  in  every  variety  of  '  Rimur. '  .  .  .  The  '  Rimur,'  in 
mediaeval  and  modern  Iceland,  have  replaced  the  Saga  as  the 
national  artistic  mode  of  expression  and  subject  of  entertain- 
ment." 

The  following  lines  from  the  Olafs-Rima  of  Einar  Gilsson 
remind  us,  in  their  easy  swing,  of  the  earlier  work  of  Robert  of 
Gloucester  in  English: 

"  Olaf  r  kongur  aorr  ok  f riffr :  atti  Noregi  at  raSa ; 

gramr  var  se  viS  bragna  bliSr :  buinn  til  sigrs  ok  na5a. 
Daogling  h£lt  sva  dyran  heiSr:  dr6ttni  himna  hallar; 
engi  skyrir  aorvar  meiSr:  aoSlings  fraegSir  allar." 

It  will  be  noted  that  in  the  extracts  given  we  have  feminine 
rhyme  as  well  as  masculine.  In  Icelandic,  as  elsewhere  after 
1300,  the  poet's  art  added  to  the  old  refrains  and  burdens  an 
effective  grouping  of  lines  into  stanzas  or  strophes.  Of  the 
literary  value  of  the  later  verse  Vigfusson  and  Powell  give  no 
very  enthusiastic  account.  The  Reformation  hymns,  as  in 
Germany,  were  rough  affairs,  but  always  with  alliteration. 

Turning  to  the  eastern  field,  an  interesting  account  of  the 
curiosities  of  rhyme  to  be  found  in  the  originals  of  the  Quatrains 


72  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

of  Omar  Khayyam  (Persian,  eleventh  and  twelfth  centuries)  is 
given  in  John  Payne's  literal  translation  of  eight  hundred  and 
forty-five  of  them.1  Mr.  Payne  reproduces  these  peculiarities,  as 
far  as  possible,  in  his  English  version.  The  usual  rhyme-scheme 
is  aaba,  but  occasionally  the  form  is  aaaa.  Various  metres  are 
employed,  the  third  line  sometimes  being  different  from  the  other 
three.  A  "throw-back"  rhyme  is  common,  there  being  at  the 
ends  of  the  rhyming  lines,  in  the  original,  from  one  to  seven 
identical  syllables  after  the  rhyming  syllables.  In  the  following 
there  are  four: 

"  Skinker  [Tapster],  since  ruin  is  of  fortune  planned  for  thee  and  me, 
This  nether  world  is  no  abiding  land  for  thee  and  me ; 
Yet,  so  the  wine-cup  in  the  midst  but  stand  for  thee  and  me, 
Rest  thou  assured  the  very  Truth's  in  hand  for  thee  and  me." 

"Interior"  rhyme  is  simply  modern  "internal"  rhyme,  as  in 

"  With  a  fair-faced  maid  and  wine  rose-red,  by  the  streamlet's  brink, 
Of  ease  and  leisure  I  '11  take  my  pleasure  nor  pause  to  think : 
I  was  not  aye,  but  am  to-day  and  yet  will  be; 
I  've  drunk  of  yore  and  drink  e'ermore  and  yet  will  drink." 

Virtually  the  same  is  what  Mr.  Payne  calls  "  ding-dong  rhyme  " : 

"Now  the  mead  with  the  sound  of  the  Thousand-Tales'  singing  is 

ringing, 

Take  the  wine  the  fair,  tipsily  to  and  fro  swinging,  is  bringing : 
Up,  the  rosebud  of  gladness  hath  blossomed  I    Awhile  in  the  garden 
Make  merry,  for  life,  whilst  to  sorrow  thou  'rt  clinging,  is  winging." 

The  "counter-petard"  is 

"They  say  that  a  tavern-besetter  I  am ;  —  I  am : 
That  a  toper  and  wanton-abettor  I  am ;  —  I  am. 
My  outward  I  rede  thee  but  little  consider;  in  sooth, 
Such  at  heart  as  (no  worse  and  no  better)  I  am,  I  am." 

The  "echo-rhyme"  differs  from  the  last  in  that  it  merely  re- 
peats the  final  syllables,  without  additional  statement : 

"Liquid  life  in  the  chalice  we  troll  is  flowing,  flowing; 
In  the  grape-blood's  incorporate  soul  is  flowing,  flowing ; 
In  the  heart  of  the  frozen  water  [crystal  cup]  fluid  fire  is ; 
Red  ruby  in  crystal  bowl  is  flowing,  flowing." 

1  The  Quatrains  of  Omar  Kheyyam  of  Nishapour,  now  first  com- 
pletely done  into  English  verse  from  the  Persian,  by  John  Payne. 
London,  1898. 


END-RHYME  73 

The  following  Mr.  Payne  calls  the  "most  curious  of  all " : 

."  I  spake,  thou  spakest :  heart  gave  I  thee,  thou  me  disdain. 
I  take,  thou  takest,  thou  heart  from  me,  I  from  thee  pain. 
I  am,  thou  art,  too  —  thou  merry,  I  for  thee  sad. 
I  make,  thou  makest,  thou  wrong  and  I  patience  in  vain." 

The  Eastern  usage,  says  Mr.  Payne,  "arranges  an  author's 
poetical  works  not  in  the  order  of  their  composition  or  in  accord- 
ance with  their  tenor,  but  in  mechanical  alphabetical  sequence, 
according  to  the  letters  which  end  the  rhyme-words  of  the  various 
pieces." 

Of  rhymes  running  down  through  the  first  syllables  of  the 
stanza  I  find  no  example  in  any  language,1  though  in  Sidney 
Lanier's  The  Symphony  (not  in  stanzas)  are  the  following  con- 
secutive lines: 

"We  weave  in  the  mills  and  heave  in  the  kilns, 
We  sieve  mine-meshes  under  the  hills, 
And  thieve  much  gold  from  the  Devil's  bank-tills, 
To  relieve,  O  God,  what  manner  of  ills?" 

In  the  same  poem  are: 

"Alas,  for  the  poor  to  have  some  part 
In  yon  sweet  living  lands  of  Art, 
Makes  problem  not  for  head  but  heart. 
Vainly  might  Plato's  brain  revolve  it : 
Plainly  the  heart  of  a  child  could  solve  it." 

At  the  conclusion  of  this  general  view  of  the  evolution  of  end- 
rhyme  in  various  languages,  a  few  words  may  be  said  concerning 
the  relation  of  rhyme  to  the  possibility  of  effective  translation  from 
one  language  to  another. 

The  discussion  of  rhyme-effects  in  translation  is  one  which 
might  easily  be  expanded  into  a  volume.  In  general,  it  goes  with- 
out saying  that  a  hexameter  line  in  a  highly  inflected  language 
like  the  Greek  cannot  be  transferred  to  a  pentameter  line  in 
a  loosely  inflected  language  like  the  English,  depending  so  much 
upon  collateral  monosyllables  for  noun-and  verb- variations  of 
meaning.  If  a  line  overruns,  its  unity  is  lost ;  if  one  Greek  line 
is  put  into  two  English,  there  must  be  padding  to  fill  it  out ;  and 
when  these  two  lines  become  a  rhyming  couplet,  as  in  Pope's 
1  See  Appendix,  page  208. 


74  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

Homer,  the  central  idea  of  the  verse-structure  is  modified  almost 
beyond  recognition.  A  similar  remark  may  be  made  concerning 
certain  English  versions  of  the  Mneid.  In  the  Odes  of  Horace  in 
English  rhyme,  a  new  poem  is  substituted  for  an  old  one,  with  the 
retention  of  more  or  less  of  the  meaning,  and  less,  rather  than 
more,  of  the  form. 

Again,  in  modern  languages  using  end-rhyme,  even  where  the 
genius  and  word-forms  of  two  Teutonic  tongues  are  as  nearly 
alike  as  in  English  and  German,  it  inevitably  occurs  that  shades 
of  meaning,  in  the  vocabulary  of  the  language  in  which  the  trans- 
lation appears,  make  an  identical  word-transfer  impossible  in 
some  cases ;  while  if  a  new  word  is  substituted,  the  whole  venue 
is  changed.  Some  of  Bayard  Taylor's  renderings  of  German 
lyrics  are  very  clever,  and  even  satisfactory;  so  are  the  line-for- 
line  versions  of  Poe's  Raven  in  German.  But  when  a  sympathetic 
and  intelligent  French  poet  like  Stephane  Mallarme*  seeks  to  give 
his  countrymen  an  idea  of  The  Raven,  he  frankly  recognizes  the 
difference  between  strongly  stressed  English  and  almost  accent- 
less  French,  and  puts  his  rendering  into  prose.  Thus  the  ver- 
sion becomes,  as  regards  form,  a  paraphrase,  in  which,  however, 
more  of  the  idea  and  even  of  the  effect  is  carried  over  than  would 
be  in  any  attempt  —  foredoomed  to  failure  —  to  follow  the 
external  form. 

In  the  rhyme-word,  of  course,  there  is  not  only  its  usual  prose 
sense  but  an  added  emphasis  of  meaning  due  to  position  and 
to  contrast  with  another  word  or  words,  and  an  added  pleas- 
ure because  of  inherent  music.  How  much  of  all  this  is  necessarily 
lost  in  a  prose  translation  —  and  there  is  also  a  loss  if  new  rhyme- 
words  are  set  up  in  the  other  language  —  may  be  seen  when  we 
compare  the  first  lyrical  passage  of  Tennyson's  Brook  with  the 
French  version  by  Professor  A.  Beljame : 

."I  come  from  haunts  of  coot  and  hern, 

I  make  a  sudden  sally, 
And  sparkle  out  among  the  fern, 
To  bicker  down  a  valley. 

"  By  thirty  hills  I  hurry  down, 
Or  slip  between  the  ridges, 
By  twenty  thorps,  a  little  town, 
And  half  a  hundred  bridges. 


END-RHYME  75 

"  Till  last  by  Philip's  farm  I  flow 

To  join  the  brimming  river, 
For  men  may  come  and  men  may  go, 
But  I  go  on  for  ever." 

"Je  viens  des  demeures  de  la  poule  d'eau  et  du  he'ron;  je  fais  une 
Bortie  soudaine  et  apparais  e"tincelant  parmi  la  fougere,  pour  traverser  a 
grand  fracas  une  valle"e. 

"Le  long  de  trente  collines  je  me  pre*cipite,  ou  je  me  glisse  entre  leurs 
crates,  le  long  de  vingt  hameaux,  d'une  petite  ville,  et  d'une  demi- 
centaine  de  ponts. 

"Enfin,  le  long  de  la  ferme  de  Philip,  je  coule  pouraller  me  joindre  a 
la  riviere  aux  pleins  bords ;  car  les  hommes  peuvent  venir  et  les  hommes 
peuvent  s'en  aller,  mais  moi  je  vais  toujours." 

Examples  could  be  multiplied  indefinitely ;  let  us  take  another 
significant  one:  F.  Rabbe's  translation  (1887)  of  Shelley's  To 
Jane  (otherwise  called  An  Ariette  for  Music),  the  closing  stanza  of 
which,  in  the  original,  is  a  nobly  poetic  statement  of  the  mystical 
union  of  all  lovely  things  in  the  poet's  mind.  In  this  French 
prose  the  whole  thought  is  really  transferred  from  language  to 
language,  while  the  verse-form  is  utterly  lost : 

"Les  pe^antes  e"toiles  scintillaient,  et  la  brillante  lune  se 
levait  au  milieu  d'elles,  chere  Jane;  la  guitare  re"sonnait,  mais 
les  notes  n'etaient  pas  suaves  jusqu'a  ce  que  votre  voix  les 
chantat  a  son  tour.  Comme  la  tendre  splendeur  de  la  lune 
s'e"pand  sur  la  faible  et  froide  lueur  du  ciel  e"toile",  ainsi 
votre  tr£s  tendre  voix  aux  cordes  sans  ame  alors  pr£ta  la 
sienne. 

"Les  e"toiles  s'eVeilleront,  quoique  la  lune  dorme  une  pleine 
heure  de  plus,  cette  nuit;  aucune  feuille  ne  s'agitera,  tandis  que 
les  rose"es  de  votre  me'lodie  s£meront  le  bonheur.  Quoique  1'har- 
monie  accable  1'ame,  chantez  encore;  que  votre  ch£re  voix  re"vele 
les  accents  d'un  monde  bien  loin  du  n6tre,  ou  la  musique,  la 
clarte"  de  la  lune,  et  le  sentiment  ne  font  qu'un." 

In  general  the  more  imaginative  the  poem  the  harder  it  is  to 
translate.  But  sometimes,  by  a  tour-de-force,  unexpected  results 
are  secured,  as,  for  instance,  in  the  more  than  clever  rendering 
of  Hood's  Bridge  of  Sighs,  into  a  similarly-lilting  Latin  rhyme, 
by  Robert  Yelverton  Tyrrell,  formerly  professor  of  Greek  at 
Dublin  (in  the  interesting  volumes  of  Latin  and  Greek  versions 
entitled  Florilegium  Latinum,  edited  by  F.  St.  J.  Thackeray  and 


76  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

E.  D.  Stone;  London,  1899-1902).    A  single  extract  will  show  its 
method  and  measurable  success : 

f  Take  her  up  tenderly, 
Lift  her  with  care ; 
Fashion'd  so  slenderly, 
Young,  and  so  fair  I" 

"tollite  facile 

onus  tarn  bellum, 
corpus  tarn  gracile 
tamque  tenellum." 

Sometimes,  as  in  Fairfax's  Tasso  and  a  recent  rendering  of  the 
JEneid,  the  Spenserian  stanza  is  not  ineffectively  made  the  vehi- 
cle of  the  version.  The  measure  is  utterly  changed,  but  at  least  the 
mellifluous  continuity  is  repeated  and  to  some  extent  re-created. 
The  "traditore,  traduttore"  of  the  Italian  proverb  may  be  more 
apparent  in  an  attempted  line-for-line  translation  than  in  an 
honest  transfer  of  the  thought  and  song  into  the  different  utter- 
ances demanded  by  the  genius  of  the  translator's  language.  In 
Gabriel  Mourey's  versions  of  the  first  series  of  Swinburne's 
Poems  and  Ballads,  in  melodious  half-rhythmical  French  prose, 
the  English  reader  can  at  times  reconstruct  the  original  —  metre, 
rhymes,  and  all  —  from  the  foreign  page  before  him.  That 
is  true  translation,  not  the  intrusion  of  a  new  poem  bearing  no 
closer  relation  to  the  original  than  do  the  ornamental  "tran- 
scriptions" in  music  which  befiddle  a  simple  air  almost  beyond 
recognition,  and  quite  beyond  enjoyment.  Let  the  translator 
preserve  rhyme- word,  line,  and  idea  if  he  can;  but  always  re- 
member that  the  letter  killeth,  but  the  spirit  giveth  life. 

Francis  Mahony,  who  carried  paraphrase  very  far,  justifies  his 
course  in  the  preface  to  the  1860  edition  of  The  Reliques  of 
Father  Prout: 

"Prout  did  his  best  to  rival  him  of  Malmesbury,  but  he  held 
that  in  the  clear  failure  of  one  language  to  elicit  from  its  reper- 
tory an  exact  equivalent,  it  becomes  not  only  proper  but  impera- 
tive (on  the  law  principle  of  Cestui  apres  in  case  of  trusts)  to  fall 
back  on  an  approximate  word  or  idea  of  kindred  import,  the  inter- 
change in  vocabulary  showing  at  times  even  a  balance  in  favour  of 
the  substitute,  as  happens  in  the  ordinary  course  of  barter  on  the 


END-RHYME  77 

markets  of  the  world.  He  quite  abhorred  the  clumsy  servility  of 
adhering  to  the  letter  while  allowing  the  spirit  to  evaporate;  a 
mere  verbal  echo  distorted  by  natural  anfractuosities,  gives  back 
neither  the  tone  nor  quality  of  the  original  voice ;  while  the  ease 
and  curious  felicity  of  the  primitive  utterance  is  marred  by  awk- 
wardness and  effort ;  spontaneity  of  song  being  the  quintessence." 

The  history  of  English  rhyme  will  occupy  the  remainder  of 
these  pages.  Some  general  remarks  may  here  be  given,  as  bear- 
ing on  this  or  that  portion  of  the  subsequent  discussion. 

End-rhyme,  since  its  splendid  establishment  by  Chaucer,  has 
virtually  monopolized  all  English  poetry  save  blank  verse:  It  is, 
says  Saintsbury,  to  the  modern  ear  so  agreeable  that  it  "can 
only  be  expelled  by  deliberate  and  unnatural  crotchet  from  any 
but  narrative  and  dramatic  poetry."  Indeed,  narrative  poetry  is 
usually  rhymed,  very  frequently  in  couplets.  Most  unrhymed 
non-iambic  English  metres,  when  read  aloud,  sound  merely  like 
rhythmical  prose,  inferior  to  many  parts  of  the  Authorized  Ver- 
sion of  the  Bible.  The  really  good  unrhymed  English  lyrics  are 
few:  Collins's  Ode  to  Evening;  Lamb's  The  Old  Familiar  Faces; 
Tennyson's  Tears,  Idle  Tears;  Longfellow's  The  Bells  of  Lynn; 
and  not  many  more. 

In  the  use  of  end-rhyme  in  English,  for  the  past  five  hundred 
years,  the  following  principles  have  been  approved  as  generally 
advisable :  The  rhyming  words  should  not  be  of  the  same  genre, 
—  as  de  Banville  says  of  French  rhyme.  The  caesura  should  be 
constantly  shifted,  for  if  kept  in  the  same  place  the  lines  would 
be  cut  up  into  monotonous  little  sub-lines.  The  chief  stress- 
words  and  the  rhyme-words  should  coincide  when  possible,  and 
should  carry  an  illuminating  power  as  the  poem  proceeds.  In 
no  case,  even  in  narrative  poetry,  should  the  rhyme-words  be 
insignificant.  The  rhyme-words  should  be  related  in  thought  to 
the  stress- words  before  the  caesural  pauses.  Antepenultimate 
rhymes  cannot  long  be  used,  save  in  humorous  verse.  Feminine 
rhymes  are  legitimate  and  indispensable,  but  cannot  be  intro- 
duced consecutively  save  in  short  lyrics.  More  than  four  con- 
secutive rhymes  of  any  kind  seem  jocose.  The  eye  objects  to 
identical  though  non-rhyming  endings,  e.  g.,  in  four-line  order, 
perfuming,  spring,  blooming,  sing.  Such  rhymes  as  fire :  higher 


78  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

—  really  a  monosyllable  and  a  dissyllable  —  are  allowable.  "  Po- 
etic license"  also  allows  a  stretching  in  the  case  of  indispensable 
words  having  few  rhymes,  —  such  as  heaven :  given,  river :  ever, 
woman :  human,  etc.  Indeed,  I  have  sometimes  thought  that  an 
essay  might  be  written  on  the  Morals  of  the  Rhyming  Dictionary, 
showing  how  the  thought  of  the  race  has  been  modified  by  the 
lack  of  good  rhymes  to  such  basal  words  as  duty,  love,  and 
heaven. 

Identical  syllables  (the  French  "perfect  rhyme")  are  not  gen- 
erally permissible  in  English ;  Chaucer's  seke  (seek) :  seke  (sick) 
would  not  be  allowed  in  modern  use. 

End-rhyme  and  thought-rhyme  usually  coincide,  of  course,  in 
the  rhyming  syllables,  but  sometimes  —  especially  when  the 
strong  accent  is  on  non-rhyming  antepenultimates — the  thought- 
stress  pleasurably  overcomes  the  rhyme-stress.  This  may  occur 
when  the  final  syllables  are  identical,  as  in  Milton's  symphony : 
harmony,  or  not,  as  in  Moore's 

"  Down  in  yon  summervale 

Where  the  rill  flows, 

Thus  said  the  Nightingale 

To  his  loved  rose,"  — 

which  Schipper  calls  "unaccented  rhyme."  1 

1  An  interesting  example  of  identity  may  be  found  in  d'Annunzio's 
Eravamo  sette  sorette  (song  of  La  Sirenetta  in  La  Gioconda) : 

"La  prima  per  filare 
e  voleva  i  fusi  d'oro ; 
la  seconda  per  tramare 
e  voleva  le  spole  d'oro; 
la  terza  per  cucire 
e  voleva  gli  aghi  d'oro; 
la  quarta  per  imbandire 
e  voleva  le  coppe  d'oro; 
la  quinta  per  dormire 
e  voleva  le  coltri  d'oro ; 
la  sesta  per  sognare 
e  voleva  i  sogni  d'oro." 

"Unaccented  rhyme,"  where  the  rapid  thought  renders  the  ends  of  the 
lines  almost  negligible,  is  also  well  illustrated  in  Scott's  Pibroch  of  Donuil 
Dhu  and  "Where  shall  the  lover  rest,"  and  Tennyson's  Charge  of 
the  Light  Brigade.  Drayton  had  anticipated  it  in  Agincourt,  at  the 
beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century. 


END-RHYME  79 

"When  few  people  can  read,"  says  A.  J.  Ellis,  "rhymes  to  be 
intelligible  must  be  perfect"  —  a  surprising  remark  in  view  of 
the  fact  that  ballads  and  nursery  jingles,  in  general,  are  satisfied 
with  any  sort  of  similarity  of  sound.  It  is  true,  however,  that 
with  the  development  of  printing  a  new  element  came  in, 
namely,  "rhymes  to  the  eye,"  which  have  exerted  some  influence 
upon  poets  for  four  hundred  years. 

Another  writer  on  the  subject  (Tom  Hood  the  younger,  in  The 
Rhymester),  lays  down  the  rule  to  "use  such  rhymes  only  as  are 
perfect  to  the  ear,  when  correctly  pronounced"  —  a  counsel  of 
perfection  to  which  no  demur  can  be  made;  but  elsewhere  he 
admits  that  "rhyme  is  a  fetter,  undoubtedly."  With  this  agrees 
Henry  Newbolt,  to  whom  "bad  or  partial  rhymes  may  be  some- 
times better  than  good  ones,  because  of  the  relief  they  afford  to  a 
wearied  sense." 

Finally,  the  problem  is  slightly  simplified  by  the  fact  that 
there  are  some  rhymeless  words  in  the  language.  Andrew  Lor- 
ing,  the  latest  compiler  of  a  rhyming  dictionary,  gives  a  list  of  such 
words  (including  only  monosyllables  or  words  accented  on  the 
last  syllable)  as  follows : 

Aitch,  alb,  amongst,  avenge,  bilge,  bourn,  breadth,  brusque, 
bulb,  coif,  conch,  culm,  cusp,  depth,  doth,  eighth,  fifth,  film,  forge, 
forth,  fourth,  fugue,  gulf,  hemp,  lounge,  mauve,  month,  morgue, 
mourned,  mouth  (verb),  ninth,  oblige,  of,  peart,  pint,  porch, 
pork,  poulp,  prestige,  puss,  recumb,  sauce,  scarce,  scarf,  sixth, 
spoilt,  swoln,  sylph,  tenth,  torsk,  twelfth,  unplagued,  volt  |i"a 
term  in  the  menage"],  warmth,  wasp,  wharves,  width,  with,  wolf, 
wolves.  Some  of  these,  however,  as  Mr.  Loring  adds,  are 
rhymeable  because  of  certain  permissible  variations  of  pro- 
nunciation, and  most  are  not  poetic  words  —  pace  Browning's 
amazing  Hugues :  fugues,  in  his  Master  Hugues  of  Saxe-Gotha. 

There  is,  of  course,  an  indefinite  number  of  words  like  unintelli- 
gibleness, accented  back  of  the  antepenult,  which  have  no 
rhymes,  or  like  injury,  which  can  be  rhymed  only  in  the  Don 
Juan  or  Father  Prout  way,  by  inventing  such  a  jocose  phrase 
as  "singe  your  eye,"  etc.  But  all  these  wanderers  in  the  outer 
silence  of  rhymeland  are  of  small  importance. 

For  the  stanza,  the  choice  of  arrangement  of  rhyme  is  wide, 


80  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

but  not  indefinite.  Save  in  the  ode,  the  rhyming  lines  should  not 
be  separated  by  more  than  three  lines  at  the  most.  The  stanza 
is  a  thought-unit,  but  there  are  "run-on"  stanzas  as  well  as  lines. 
Even  so  sententious  a  poem  as  Gray's  Elegy  has  one  stanza  with- 
out even  a  punctuation-mark  at  its  end. 

For  convenience'  sake  I  give  here  specimen  stanzas  of  from 
two  to  fourteen  lines;  for  the  sonnet  is  virtually  a  stanza.  Be- 
yond this  it  is  not  necessary  to  go  (Shakespeare's  Sonnet  CXXVI 
has  twelve  lines;  his  Sonnet  XCIX  fifteen;  George  Meredith's 
quasi  stanzas  in  Modern  Love  sixteen;  and  Spenser's  Epithala- 
mion  eighteen  and  nineteen) : 

Two  lines: 

"Comrades,  leave  me  here  a  little,  while  as  yet 't  is  early  morn, 
Leave  me  here,  and  when  you  want  me,  sound  upon  the  bugle  horn." 

TENNYSON  :  Locksley  Hail. 

Three: 

"Whoe'er  she  be, 
That  not  impossible  She 
That  shall  command  my  heart  and  me;  — " 

SUCKLING  :  Wishes  for  the  Supposed  Mistress. 

Four: 

"The  curfew  tolls  the  knell  of  parting  day, 
The  lowing  herd  winds  slowly  o'er  the  lea, 
The  ploughman  homeward  plods  his  weary  way, 
And  leaves  the  world  to  darkness  and  to  me." 

GRAY:  Elegy. 

Five : 

"Go,  lovely  rose! 

Tell  her  that  wastes  her  time  and  me, 
That  now  she  knows, 
When  I  resemble  her  to  thee, 
How  sweet  and  fair  she  seems  to  be." 

WALLER:  Song. 

Six: 

f'He  that  loves  a  rosy  cheek 

Or  a  coral  lip  admires, 
Or  from  star-like  eyes  doth  seek 

Fuel  to  maintain  his  fires ; 
As  old  Time  makes  these  decay 
So  his  flames  must  waste  away." 

CAREW:  The  True  Beauty. 


END-RHYME  81 

Seven  : 

"Pite  that  I  have  sought  so  yore  ago 

With  herte  sore  and  ful  of  besy  peyne, 
That  in  this  worlde  was  never  wight  so  wo 
With-oute  dethe ;  and  if  I  shal  not  feyne, 
My  purpos  was  to  Pite  to  compleyne 
Upon  the  crueltee  and  tirannye 
Of  Love,  that  for  my  trouthe  doth  me  dye." 

CHAUCER  :  The  Compleynte  unto  Pite. 

Eight: 

"Jack  and  Jone  they  thinke  no  ill, 
But  loving  live,  and  merry  still ; 
Do  their  weeke-dayes'  worke,  and  pray 
Devotely  on  the  holy  day: 
Skip  and  trip  it  on  the  greene, 
And  help  to  chuse  the  Summer  Queene; 
Lash  out,  at  a  country  feast, 
Their  silver  penny  with  the  best." 

Campion. 

Nine : 

"A  gentle  knight  was  pricking  on  the  plaine, 

Ycladd  in  mightie  armes  and  silver  shielde, 
Wherein  old  dints  of  deepe  woundes  did  remaine, 

The  cruell  markes  of  many  a  bloody  fielde ; 

Yet  armes  till  that  tune  did  he  never  wield. 
His  angry  steede  did  chide  his  foming  bitt, 

As  much  disdaining  to  the  curbe  to  yield : 
Full  jolly  knight  he  seemd,  and  faire  did  sitt, 
As  one  for  knightly  giusts  and  fierce  encounters  fitt." 

SPENSER  :  Faerie  Queene. 

Ten: 

"Fain  would  I  change  that  note 

To  which  fond  love  hath  charmed  me 
Long  long  to  sing  by  rote, 

Fancying  that  that  harm'd  me : 
Yet  when  this  thought  doth  come, 
'  Love  is  the  perfect  sum 

Of  all  delight,' 
I  have  no  other  choice 
Either  for  pen  or  voice 

To  sing  or  write." 

Anon. 

Eleven : 

."From  depth  of  dool  wherein  my  soul  doth  dwell, 
From  heavy  heart  which  harbors  in  my  breast, 
From  troubled  sprite  which  seldom  taketh  rest, 
6 


82  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH   RHYME 

From  hope  of  heaven,  from  dread  of  darksome  hell  — 
O  gracious  God,  to  thee  I  cry  and  yell. 
My  God,  my  Lord,  my  loving  Lord  alone, 
To  Thee  I  call,  to  Thee  I  make  my  moan; 
And  thou,  good  God,  vouchsafe  in  full  to  take 
This  woful  plaint, 
Wherein  I  faint; 
Oh  hear  me  then  for  thy  great  mercies'  sake." 

GASCOIGNE  :  De  Profundis. 

Twelve : 

"This  Life,  which  seems  so  fair, 
Is  like  a  bubble  blown  up  in  the  air 

By  sporting  children's  breath, 
Who  chase  it  everywhere 

And  strive  who  can  most  motion  it  bequeath. 

And  though  it  sometimes  seem  of  its  own  might 
Like  to  an  eye  of  gold  to  be  fix  'd  there, 

And  firm  to  hover  in  that  empty  height, 

That  only  is  because  it  is  so  light. 
But  in  that  pomp  it  doth  not  long  appear; 

For  when  'tis  most  admired,  in  a  thought, 
Because  it  erst  was  nought,  it  turns  to  nought." 

Drummond. 

Thirteen  (roundel): 

"Now  welcom  somer,  with  thy  sonne  softe, 
That  hast  this  wintres  weders  over-shake, 
And  driven  awey  the  longe  nightes  blake  ! 

Seynt  Valentyn,  that  art  ful  hy  on-lof te :  — 
Thus  singen  smale  foules  for  thy  sake  — 

Now  welcom  somer,  with  thy  sonne  softe, 

That  hast  this  wintres  weders  over-shake. 

Wei  han  they  cause  for  to  gladen  ofte, 

Sith  ech  of  hem  recovered  hath  his  make ; 

Ful  blisf ul  may  they  singen  whan  they  wake ; 
Now  welcom  somer,  with  thy  sonne  softe, 
That  hast  this  wintres  weders  over-shake, 
And  driven  awey  the  longe  nightes  blake." 

CHAUCER  :  The  Parlement  of  Follies. 

Fourteen  (sonnet): 

"Poor  Soul,  the  centre  of  my  sinful  earth, 

Fool  'd  by  those  rebel  powers  that  thee  array, 
Why  dost  thou  pine  within,  and  suffer  dearth, 

Painting  thy  outward  walls  so  costly  gay? 
Why  so  large  cost,  having  so  short  a  lease, 

Dost  thou  upon  thy  fading  mansion  spend? 
Shall  worms,  inheritors  of  this  excess, 

Eat  up  thy  charge?  is  this  thy  body's  end? 


END-RHYME  83 

Then,  Soul,  live  thou  upon  thy  servant's  loss, 

And  let  that  pine  to  aggravate  thy  store ; 
Buy  terms  divine  in  selling  hours  of  dross ; 

Within  be  fed,  without  be  rich  no  more :  — 
So  shalt  thou  feed  on  death,  that  feeds  on  men, 
And  death  once  dead,  there  's  no  more  dying  then." 

SHAKESPEARE  :  Sonnet  CXLVI. 

The  sonnet,  appearing  at  about  the  same  time  in  Proven9al 
and  Italian,  was  soon  a  favorite  form  in  both  France  and  Eng- 
land, under  Italian  influence.  The  normal  arrangement  is  four- 
teen five-stressed  lines,  in  which  the  statement  is  made  in  the 
first  eight  and  the  application  in  the  last  six,  there  being  but  two 
rhymes  in  the  octet  and  two  or  three  in  the  sextet.  The  first 
part,  furthermore,  may  be  considered  as  composed  of  two 
quatrains  and  the  second  of  two  tercets.  The  rhyme-scheme  is 
abbaabbacdcdcd,  —  or  some  variant  arrangement  in  the  closing 
six.  But  in  the  French  sonnet  the  measure,  because  of  the 
genius  of  the  language,  is  alexandrine,  and  the  regular  rhyme- 
scheme  is  abbaabbaccdede,  with  frequent  changes  in  the  sextet.  In 
English,  the  Shakespearean  sonnet  forms  the  greatest  variation. 
Here  the  normal  arrangement  is  three  quatrains,  —  which  would 
be  stanzas  were  it  not  for  their  connected  thought,  —  rhymed 
abab;  the  last  two  lines  being  an  application,  rhyming  together. 
From  these  usual  arrangements  the  sonnet  breaks  away  in  many 
variations;  as  where  Milton,  in  his  great  outburst  On  the  late 
Massacre  in  Piedmont,  begins  in  line  8  a  sentence  ending  in  line  9, 
though  preserving  the  abbaabbacdcdcd  rhyme-system.  Here  his 
indignant  passion  is  given  greater  force  by  the  overrunning,  while 
unity  is  preserved  by  strict  adherence  to  the  rhyming  plan. 

In  the  sonnet  the  weakness  of  feminine  rhymes  is  sufficiently 
obvious.  Hartley  Coleridge's  sonnets  suffer  in  this  regard,  and 
so,  even,  does  Shakespeare's  "Farewell  1  thou  art  too  dear  for  my 
possessing,"  though  the  feminine  rhymes  are  intentional  and 
carefully  arranged  throughout  twelve  of  the  fourteen  lines. 

As  regards  the  kinds  and  forms  of  verse,  the  lyric  expresses 
itself  in  an  almost  indefinite  series  of  combinations  of  foot,  stress, 
elision,  extra  syllable,  hovering  accent,  line,  masculine  rhyme, 
feminine  rhyme,  postponed  rhyme,  refrain,  prose  insertion,  and 
what  not.  Didactic  verse  naturally  falls  into  the  rhymed  iambic 


84 

pentameter  couplet,  which  lends  itself  almost  equally  well  to 
description.  Four-stressed  measures,  in  iambic  movement, 
befit  the  varied  portrayals  and  suggestions  of  the  genre  of  U Alle- 
gro and  II  Penseroso,  as  well  as  heroic-descriptive  poems  like 
Marmion,  and  quieter  presentations  such  as  Snow-Bound.  The 
Cotter's  Saturday  Night,  not  less  than  The  Faerie  Qiieene  itself, 
employs  one  of  the  most  elaborate  modifications  of  Chaucer's 
Troilus  stanza.  The  Spenserian  stanza  has  again  and  again  been 
used  as  the  vehicle  for  translations  of  works  as  far  removed  from 
Spenser's  "phantasmagoria"  as  is  the  Mneid.  Elegies,  while 
generally  following  slow  iambic  measures,  are  ode-like  in  their 
variety  of  rhyme-arrangement.  The  drama,  when  employing 
rhyme,  finds  place  both  for  the  most  variant  lyrics  and  for  the 
most  mechanical  end-stopped  lines  at  the  close  of  scenes  and 
significant  paragraphs.  Blank  verse  builds  the  epic,  and  also 
philosophical  poems  like  Thanatopsis,  —  which,  had  it  been 
written  in  the  eighteenth  century,  would  probably  have  been 
rhymed  (as  it  was,  in  part,  in  its  original  form) ;  while,  on  the 
other  hand,  the  two  authors  of  the  Lyrical  Ballads  ranged  all  the 
way,  in  their  respective  masterpieces,  from  the  stanza  of  The 
Ancient  Mariner  to  the  freedom  of  line-length  and  rhyme- 
distance  shown  in  the  Ode  on  Immortality.  All  that  we  can  assert 
with  confidence  is  that  dignity  comports  with  iambic  slowness 
and  the  masculine  rhyme ;  while  fancy  may  trip  it  as  it  goes,  in  a 
freer  use  of  trochaics  and  feminine  terminations. 


VI 
THE  SHAPING   OF  ENGLISH   RHYME 

THE  writings  wherein  Old  English,  or  Anglo-Saxon,  found  ex- 
pression are,  of  course,  of  relative  rather  than  absolute  value. 
In  the  long  period  between  the  first  English  invasion  of  England 
(449)  and  the  Norman  Conquest  (1066)  four  works  or  groups  of 
works  stand  out,  —  two  in  verse  and  two  in  prose,  namely  the 
paraphrases  of  Genesis,  Exodus,  and  Daniel,  connected  with  the 
name  of  the  half-mythical  Csedmon;  the  anonymous  brief  epic 
narrating  the  deeds  of  Beowulf ;  the  translations,  adaptations,  or 
suggestions  of  King  Alfred;  and  the  Anglo-Saxon  Chronicle. 
Of  the  two'original  works  in  this  scanty  list,  Beowulf  possesses  a 
rugged  strength  and  an  occasional  aptness  of  descriptive  phrase, 
chiefly  due  to  the  concise  alliterative  scheme  which  was  the  prin- 
cipal mark  of  Old  English  verse;  but  it  is  too  often  obscure, 
abrupt,  or  amorphous.  As  a  landmark  of  language  and  life  it  is 
highly  interesting;  as  a  piece  of  literature  one  would  gladly 
exchange  it  for  a  single  modern  English  poem  such  as  Tennyson's 
Merlin  and  the  Gleam.  The  Chronicle,  however,  has  the  peren- 
nial importance  of  being  the  first  Teutonic  history  in  folk- 
language;  and  the  student  of  poetry  finds  in  its  heterogeneous 
contents  some  welcome  bits  of  early  battle-verse. 

In  the  whole  body  of  Old  English  literature  there  is,  it  should 
be  said,  no  uniformity  of  spelling,  or  of  accentuation  to  indicate 
long  vowels  or  differences  of  meaning ;  for  there  was  nothing  to 
be  called,  in  any  sense,  a  critical  public  or  body  of  scholarship. 

In  the  time  between  the  cessation  of  the  Chronicle  (1154)  and 
the  birth  of  Chaucer,  the  two  most  significant  writings  are,  from 
the  linguistic  point  of  view,  the  Ormulum  (New  Testament  stories 
with  intricate  mathematico-philosophical  applications,  written  in 


86  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

lilting,  unrhymed,  seven-stressed  verse  by  an  ecclesiastic  named 
Ormin) ;  and  from  the  literary,  the  prose  Ancren  Riwle,  or  Nun's 
Rule  of  Life  (anonymous,  and  principally  interesting  as  the  ear- 
liest successful  attempt,  in  Old  or  Middle  English,  to  introduce 
extended  figures  of  speech). 

But  even  when  we  have  reduced  early  English  literature  to  this 
meagre  result,  we  must  never  forget  that  it  was  the  first  to  emerge 
from  the  intellectual  chaos  following  the  decline  of  Greece  and 
Rome.  It  is  easy  to  criticise;  it  is  hard  to  be  a  pioneer.  Eng- 
land led,  when  for  dreary  centuries  there  was  no  worthy  follower. 

Csedmon,  who  "flourished"  about  670,1  was  probably  an  in- 
mate of  the  abbey  of  Streaneshalch ;  he  was  of  humble  —  per- 
haps Celtic  —  descent,  and  was  not  highly  educated.  Alfred,  in 
his  translation  of  Bede's  history  of  religion  in  Britain,  gives  the 
following  as  the  original  of  the  hymn  which  Bede  says  Caedmon 
produced  when  supernaturally  commanded  to  sing: 

"nu  sculan  herigean  heofonrices  weard, 
meotodes  meahte  ond  his  m6dgepanc, 
weorc  wuldorfaeder,  swa  he"  wundra  gehwses, 
e"ce  drihten,  6r  onstealde. 
he"  serest  sce6p  eorSan  bearnum 
heofon  16  hr6fe,  halig  scyppend : 
pa  middangeard  moncynnes  weard, 
e"ce  drihten,  sefter  te"ode 
firum,  foldan,  fre"a  selmihtig." 

Richard  Garnett  speaks  of  this  famous  bit  as  "Csedmon's  un- 
doubted poem";  and  at  least  its  genuineness  has  never  been 
disproved. 

We  are  not  here  concerned  with  the  question  —  or  the  many 
quest:ons  —  as  to  Csedmon's  part  in  the  composition  of  the 

1  Those  who  wish  to  hunt  oldest  English  verse  farther  back  into  its 
fastnesses  may  turn  to  the  gnomic  verses  in  Brooke's  Early  English 
Literature,  10 ;  or  read  the  alliterative  earth-charm  which,  according  to 
Garnett  (History  of  English  Literature,  I,  6-7)  is  "probably  the  oldest 
specimen  of  English  extant":  — 

"Hal  wes  thu,  folde,  fira  modor; 
Beo  thu  growende  on  godes  faethma; 
Fodre  gefylled  firum  to  mytte." 
("Hail  to  thee,  earth,  mother  of  men; 
Be  thou  fruitful  in  God's  embrace ; 
Filled  with  fruit  for  the  good  of  men.") 


THE  SHAPING  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME          87 

tenth-century  manuscript  written  by  at  least  three  scribes,  and 
containing  paraphrases  of  Genesis,  Exodus,  and  Daniel,  together 
with  stories  of  the  fall  of  the  angels,  Christ's  temptation  in  the 
wilderness,  his  descent  into  hell,  his  resurrection  and  ascension, 
and  the  last  judgment.  Parts  of  these  may  have  been  based  on 
Csedmon' s  work;  some  are  poor  enough;  others  have  a  native 
strength  which  has  led  enthusiastic  scholars  to  find  in  them  an- 
ticipations of  Milton.  The  orthography  is  West-Saxon,  not 
Northumbrian ;  the  alliterative  and  other  poetic  marks  are  of  the 
Anglo-Saxon,  that  is,  of  the  early  Teutonic,  kind.  Henry  Brad- 
ley (in  the  Dictionary  of  National  Biography)  calls  fragments 
235-370  and  421-851  of  Grein's  edition  —  on  the  temptation  and 
fall  of  man  —  essentially  the  product  of  Csedmon' s  genius. 
Perhaps  this  and  the  Old  Saxon  Heliand  are  translations  and 
amplifications  of  lost  verses  by  Csedmon.  Some  parts  of  the  man- 
uscript are  rough,  others  smooth  to  the  extent  of  monotony.  Evi- 
dently we  have  in  Csedmon  an  Old-English  library  of  biblical 
tales,  as  confused  with  "sources"  and  "redactions"  as  the 
Bible  itself,  in  the  opinion  of  later  critics.  Meanwhile  the  student 
of  poetics  notes  that  the  verse  is  trochaic  rather  than  iambic ;  that 
it  is  often,  as  Saintsbury  says,  little  more  than  a  "sort  of  half- 
prose  recitative";  and  that  alliteration  compels  a  good  deal 
of  explosive  parallelism. 

In  Anglo-Saxon  the  half-line  preferably,  but  by  no  means  al- 
ways, ends  in  a  short  syllable,  aided  by  case-endings  and  verb- 
forms.  This  end-mark,  like  that  of  the  hexameter  in  classic 
languages,  makes  a  good  termination-sign.  Some  scholars,  it 
will  be  remembered,  think  that  the  hexameter  was  originally  an 
indefinitely  long  dactylic  line  closed  by  a  trochee.  The  regular 
Anglo-Saxon  four-measure  line  is  2:2,  two  measures  in  each 
half-line,  with  two  letter-stresses  in  the  first  half  and  one  in  the 
second,  the  third  letter-stress  being  the  strongest,  the  first  next, 
and  the  second  weakest.  Sometimes  there  is  only  one  stress  in  the 
first  half-line.  Slurs  always  come  at  the  beginning  of  the  line  or 
half-line ;  Csedmon  puts  them  after  the  line-pause. 

Vigfusson,  in  the  Corpus  Poeticum  Boreale,  tabulates  the  de- 
scent of  "Csedmon's  Old  Long  Line"  with  impossible  minute- 
ness. Of  course,  in  stressed  alliterative  verse  there  may  be  al- 


88  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

most  every  possible  combination  of  stresses  of  identical  or  similar 
sounds,  in  lines  long  or  short,  repetitious  or  different,  poetically 
exact  or  mere  loose  half-prose.  Sometimes  extra  alliterations  are 
not  stressed;  sometimes  repeated  words  answer  the  alliterative 
purpose.  Now  and  then  a  sort  of  two-line  or  couplet  effect  is 
given  by  the  endings  of  sentences ;  this  comes  chiefly  in  dramatic 
or  sententious  verse.  Perhaps  two  average  lines,  in  any  literature, 
are  about  enough  for  the  full  expression  or  turning  of  a  thought. 
Like  a  trumpet-call  was  the  outburst  of  the  first  lines  of 
Beowulf  (about  700  A.  D.) : 

"Hwset !  we  Gar-Dena    in  gear-dagum 
pe6d  cyninga    prym  gefrunon, 
hfi  pa  seSelingas     ellen  fremedon. 
Oft  Scyld  Seeling    sceatfena  preatum, 
monegum  msegSum    meodo-setta  ofteah. 
Egsode  eorl,     sySSan  serest  wear<J 
fea-sceaft  funden :     he  paes  f r6fre  gebad, 
weox  under  wolcnum,     weorG-myndum  Sab., 
65  pset  him  seghwylc     para  ymb-sittendra 
ofer  hron-rade    hyran  scolde, 
gomban  gyldan :     pset  waes  god  cyning ! 
psem  eafera  waes    aefter  cenned 
geong  in  geardum,     pone  god  sende 
folce  t&  frofre.     fyren-pearfe  ongeat, 
pset  hie  aer  drugon    aldor-lease 
lange  hwile.     Him  paes  llf-frea, 
wuldres  wealdend,     worold-are  forgeaf. 
Beowulf  waes  breme,     (blaed  wide  sprang) 
Scyldes  eafera    Scede-Landum  in." 

Professor  John  Leslie  Hall's  excellent  translation  of  Beowulf, 
which  is  alliterative  but  not  line-for-line,  retains  much  of  the 
spirit  as  well  as  the  form  of  the  original,  and  may  well  be  read  by 
those  unfamiliar  with  Anglo-Saxon.  But  I  will  give  here  Profes- 
sor John  Earle's  prose  version  of  the  above  nineteen  lines  of  this 
"English  epic  of  the  fourteenth  century,"  because  of  his  rendering 
of  the  very  first  word: 

"What  ho  !  we  have  heard  tell  of  the  grandeur  of  the  imperial 
kings  of  the  spear-bearing  Danes  in  former  days,  how  those  ethel- 
ings  promoted  bravery.  Often  did  Scyld  of  the  Sheaf  wrest  from 
harrying  bands,  from  many  tribes,  their  convivial  seats;  the 
dread  of  him  fell  upon  warriors,  whereas  he  had  at  the  first  been  a 


THE  SHAPING  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME          89 

lonely  foundling;  —  of  all  that  [humiliation]  he  lived  to  experi- 
ence solace;  he  waxed  great  under  the  welkin,  he  flourished 
with  trophies,  till  that  every  one  of  the  neighboring  peoples  over 
the  sea  were  constrained  to  obey  him,  and  pay  trewage :  —  that 
was  a  good  king  I 

"To  him  was  born  a  son  to  come  after  him,  a  young  [prince] 
in  the  palace,  whom  God  sent  for  the  people's  comfort.  He  [God] 
knew  the  hard  calamity,  what  they  had  erst  endured  when  they 
were  without  a  king  for  a  long  while ;  and  in  consideration  thereof 
the  Lord  of  Life,  the  Ruler  of  Glory,  accorded  to  them  a  time  of 
prosperity. 

"Beowulf  [i.  e.,  Beaw]  was  renowned,  his  fame  sprang  wide; 
heir  of  Scyld  in  the  Scedelands." 

Notwithstanding  its  roughness,  this  old  tale  of  Beowulf  the 
Scylding  and  Beowulf  the  Goth  shows  that  alliteration  was 
abundantly  able  to  take  care  of  itself  as  an  indigenous  and  in 
some  ways  powerful  poetic  form. 

If  the  Phoenix,  a  paraphrase  of  the  Carmen  de  Phenice  as- 
cribed to  Lactantius,  were  an  original  piece  of  Anglo-Saxon  verse, 
it  would  be  entitled  to  be  called  the  most  poetical  product  of  the 
English  mind  prior  to  1200.  How  rhythmical  is  the  following, 
from  its  description  of  the  Happy  Land : 

"Ne  maeg  Sser  r6n  ne  snaV 
ne  forstes  fnaest,  ne  fyres  blsest,' 
ne  hsegles  hryre,  ne  hrimes  dryre 
ne  sunnan  hsetu,  ne  sincald, 
ne  wearm  weder,  ne  wintersctir 
wihte  gewirdan,  ac  se  wong  seomaS 
eadig  and  onsund ;  is  Saet  seSele  lond 
b!6stmum  geb!6wen.    Beorgas  Saer  ne  muntas 
stedpe  ne  stondaS,  ne  stanclifu 
he£ih  hlifiaS,  swi  h^r  mid  us, 
ne  dena  ne  daln,  ne  dunscrafu, 
hlslwas  ne  hlincas,  ne  Seer  hleonaS  6 
unsm&fes  wiht ;  ac  se  seSela  feld 
wridaS  under  wolcnum  wynnum  geb!6wen." 

In  the  above,  besides  alliteration  and  a  splendid  swing,  are 
assonance  and  a  suggestion  of  end-rhyme. 

The  last  lines  of  the  poem  are  a  curious  macaronic  of  Anglo- 
Saxon  and  Latin: 


90  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

"  hafaS  us  alyfed 

lucis  auctor 
Sset  we  motun  h6r 

merveri 
g6d-dsedum  begietan 

gaudia  in  celo 
5ser  we  motun 

maxima  regna 
secan  and  gesittan 

sedibus  altis 
lifgan  in  lisse 

lucis  et  pacis 
agan  eardunga 

alma  letitiae 
brucan  blsed-daga 

blandem  et  mitem 
geseon  sigora  f  rean 

sine  fine 
and  him  lof  singan 

laude  perenne 
eadge  mid  englum 

alleluia."  l 

From  the  time  of  Cynewulf's  Crist,  the  Phcenix  paraphrase, 
and  the  fine  poem  Judith,  all  of  which  may  be  assigned  to  the 
years  between  750  and  780,  until  the  end  of  the  eleventh  century, 

1  "Us  hath  allowed 

[the]  Author  of  light 
that  we  may  here 

deserve, 
by  good  deeds  obtain, 

joys  in  heaven, 
where  we  may 

[the]  amplest  realms 
seek,  and  sit 

on  lofty  seats, 
live  in  the  comfort 

of  light  and  peace, 
possess  dwellings 

pleasant  of  joy, 
prosperous  days  enjoy, 

bland  and  mild ; 
[the]  Lord  of  triumphs  see 

without  end, 
and  to  him  sing  praise, 

with  laud  perpetual, 
happy  with  angels. 

Alleluia!" 


THE  SHAPING  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME          91 

alliteration  grew  less  obedient  to  its  earlier  rules,  and  was  em- 
ployed as  the  particular  singer  chose. 

In  the  Battle  of  Maldon  (about  991)  were  rudiments  of  end- 
rhyme,  e.  g.,  bigstodon :  lagon :  lagon :  gesealdon :  noldon  (perhaps 
accidental) ;  and  many  lines  near  each  other  ended  with  the  same 
word. 

The  refrain  of  the  older  Dear's  Lament  has  a  pleasing  effect 
of  thought-rhyme:  "Das  oferode,  Sisses  swa  maeg:"  "that 
was  withstood,  so  may  this  be !" 

In  Old-English  verse  of  the  tenth  century  the  rhyme  of  paral- 
lelism is  often  present;  the  important  sentence  is  continually 
doubled  in  different  words,  almost  precisely  as  in  Hebrew.  So 
it  was  in  later  Icelandic ;  the  repetition  causing  new  light  to  shine 
on  the  idea. 

End-rhyme  was,  in  its  first  appearances,  combined  with  allit- 
eration in  England,  as  in  Iceland  and  Scandinavia.  Accidental 
end-rhyme  [internal  rhyme]  is  certain  to  appear  in  alliterative 
verse,  and  so  it  is  not  strange  that  we  find  it  in  one  passage  of 
Cynewulfs  Elene  (lines  114-5): 

"peer  wses  borda  gebrec  ond  beorna  geprec, 
heard  handgeswing  ond  herga  gring." 

In  the  second  of  these  lines  there  is  really  nothing  but  an  eye- 
rhyme,  as  -swing  is  not  an  accented  syllable. 

Cynewulf,  whose  authorship  of  Elene  and  Crist  is  pretty  well 
established,  is  thought  by  some  to  have  written  the  Phoenix,  the 
Dream  of  the  Rood,  and  even  the  "Rhyming  Poem"  of  the  Codex 
Exoniensis. 

The  last-named  apparently  belongs  to  the  second  quarter  of 
the  tenth  century.  It  has  alliteration  and  also  masculine  and 
feminine  end-rhymes.  Of  literary  merit  it  possesses  not  a  ves- 
tige. Nobody  knows  its  author,  or  can  definitely  account  for  its 
multiplication  of  end-rhymes ;  but  the  fashion  of  them  was  grow- 
ing, all  around,  at  the  time  of  its  writing ;  and  we  have  already 
gone  far  enough  to  see  that  in  the  ninth  and  tenth  centuries,  in 
any  European  country  having  verse  of  any  kind,  the  non-appear- 
ance of  end-rhyme  would  have  been  a  greater  marvel  than  its 
appearance.  It  is  true,  as  Garnett  says,  that  "Latin  was  (in  the 


92  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

ninth  century)  the  only  language  in  which  the  literary  class,  apart 
from  the  makers  of  minstrelsy,  cared  to  express  itself  " ;  but 
Latin  end-rhymed  verse  was  perfectly  familiar  in  England  at  that 
time.  It  was  constantly  growing  easier  to  write  concise  rhyming 
explosives  like  the 

"Me  lifes  onlah.     se  pis  leoht  onwrah. 
and  pact  torhte  geteoh.     tillice  onwrah. 
glaed  waes  ic  gliwum.    glenged  hiwum. 
blissa  bleoum.     blostma  hiwum," 

etc.,  of  this  poem,  which  was  probably  produced  for  the  sake  of 
the  jingle.  Elsewhere  it  has  wongum :  gongum ;  longum :  geton- 
gum;  aweaht:  ofertheaht;  gengdon:  mengdon:  lengdon:  glengdon; 
glad :  inbrad :  bi-glad :  had :  gad :  rod :  gebad. 

Schipper  suggests  that  it  may  have  come  from  the  work  and  in- 
fluence of  the  Scandinavian  poet  Egil  Skallagrimsson  in  his  visits 
to  England;  but  he  adduces  no  proof.1 

In  the  Brut  of  Layamon  (about  1210)  alliteration  is  weak  or 
absent,  and  there  are  some  end-rhymes,  such  as  brother :  other ; 
might:  right;  care:  fare.  Evidently  the  poet,  writing  in  a  transi- 
tional period,  felt  at  liberty  to  use  alliteration,  assonance  (if, 
indeed,  he  noticed  it  at  all),  and  end-rhyme  as  he  chose.  Four 
stresses  are  the  rule.  In  his  ear  walden :  duden ;  daei:maei; 
Haengest :  hendest  were  equally  good ;  the  scansion  was  the  ne- 
cessary thing.  Saintsbury  says  that  Layamon  "is,  so  to  speak, 
staggering  towards  more  rhyme.  ...  It  is  scarcely  too  wild  a 
flight  to  call  the  work  of  Layamon  the  workshop,  the  experi- 
mental laboratory,  of  true  English  prosody."  2 

In  general,  Layamon  used  either  alliteration  or  end-rhyme  in  a 
given  line,  not  both  together. 

If  this  were  a  history  of  English  prosody,  not  rhyme,  much 
would  need  to  be  said  of  that  unique  poem,  the  Ormulum  of  the 
Augustinian  monk  Orm  or  Ormin.  It  is  a  diffuse  and  monot- 
onous summary  of  Gospel  contents  as  understood  by  the  pious 
and  simple-minded  author.  The  "Gospel's  holy  lore"  is  com- 

1  Of  it  Thorpe,  its  first  editor,  naively  said:    "This  poem  I  do  not 
understand,  and  am  therefore  unable  to  translate."     As  Stedman  re- 
marked about  Browning's  Bordello,  it  is  not  worth  the  trouble. 

2  History  of  English  Prosody,  51,  76. 


THE  SHAPING  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME          93 

bined,  according  to  the  mediaeval  fashion,  with  all  sorts  of  fan- 
cies, which  are  set  forth  as  having  equal  force  with  the  Bible  words 
themselves,  Thus  Christ  fasted  in  the  wilderness  because  forty  is 
four  times  ten.  The  three  persons  of  the  Trinity,  the  three  powers 
of  the  mind  (insight,  memory,  and  attention),  and  the  four  ele- 
ments of  matter  (earth,  air,  fire,  and  water),  added  together 
make  the  ten,  which,  multiplied  by  the  four  points  of  the  com- 
pass, makes  forty,  etc.  The  New  Testament  stories  are  set  forth 
with  almost  indefinite  repetitions  (the  poem  has  twenty  thousand 
lines)  of  word,  line,  or  idea ;  the  whole  being  expressed  in  a  spell- 
ing-reform system  devised  by  the  author,  which,  like  so  many  of 
its  successors,  was  ignored  by  everybody  else.  But  the  Ormulum 
has  two  great  charms :  the  sweet  simplicity  of  its  gentle  writer, 
and  its  really  marvellous  smoothness  of  seven-stressed  lines  (or 
four-stressed,  alternating  with  three,  as  now  ordinarily  printed). 
There  is  hardly  a  poem  in  all  English  literature  which,  unrhymed, 
leaves  so  strong  an  impression  of  that  finish  which  we  generally 
associate  with  rhyme. 

But  it  is  better  to  quote  a  few  lines  of  the  Ormulum  than  to  talk 
about  it.  Here  is  the  passage  in  which  Orm,  with  his  usual 
frankness,  speaks  of  a  necessity  not  unknown  to  thousands  of  his 
verse-mongering  followers : 

"Ice  hafe  sammnedd  o  piss  boc 
pa  Goddspelless  neh  alle, 
patt  sinndenn  o  pe  messeboc 
Inn  all  pe  yer  att  messe. 
3  ajj  affterr  pe  Goddspell  stannt 
patt  tatt  te  Goddspell  menepp, 
patt  mann  birrp  spellenn  to  pe  follc 
Off  pe^Jre  sawle  nede ; 
D  Jet  taer  tekenn  mare  inch 
pu  shallt  tseronne  findenn, 
Off  patt  tatt  Cristess  hall^he  ped 
Birrp  trowwenn  wel  3  folljhenn. 
Ice  hafe  sett  her  o  piss  boc 
Amang  Goddspelless  wordess, 
All  purrh  me  selfenn,  manig  word 
pe  rime  swa  to  fillenn; 
Ace  pu  shallt  findenn  patt  min  word, 
Ejjwhaer  peer  itt  iss  ekedd, 
MaJS  hellpenn  pa  patt  redenn  itt 
To  sen  3  tunnderrstanndenn 
All  pess  te  bettre  hu  pejjm  birrp 


94  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME' 

pe  Goddspell  unnderrstanndenn; 
3  forrpi  trowwe  ice  patt  te  birrp 
Wei  polenn  mine  wordess, 
E^Jwhaer  paer  pu  shallt  findenn  hemm 
Amang  Goddspelless  wordess. 
For  whase  mot  to  laewedd  follc 
Larspell  off  Goddspell  tellenn, 
He  mot  wel  ekenn  manij  word 
Amang  Goddspelless  wordess. 
3  ice  ne  mihhte  nohht  min  ferss 
A^3  wipp  Goddspelless  wordess 
Wel  fillenn  all,  3  all  forrpi 
Shollde  ice  wel  offte  nede  • 
Amang  Goddspelless  wordess  don 
Min  word,  min  ferss  to  fillenn." 

In  the  twelfth,  thirteenth,  and  fourteenth  centuries,  according 
to  several  investigators,  Norman-French  lyrics,  produced  under 
troubadour  influence,  were  familiar  in  England,  and  were  copied, 
to  some  extent,  in  the  vernacular.  But  few  such  songs  survive,  and 
those  few  are  of  small  merit.  Rhymes  and  stanzas,  suggestive  of 
Romance  models,  there  are;  but  the  native  conciseness,  almost 
bluntness,  lends  itself  ill  to  the  foreign  forms.  The  gem  of  all 
the  English  songs  of  the  period  is  the  most  natural  of  all:  the 

lovely  little 

f'Sumer  is  icumen  in, 
Lhude  sing  cuccu ! 
Groweth  sed  and  bloweth  med, 
And  springeth  the  wude  nu. 

"Awe  bleteth  after  lomb, 
Llouth  after  calve  cu : 
Bulluc  sterteth,  bucke  verteth. 
Murie  sing  cuccu ! 

"Cuccu !  cuccu  !  wel  singes  thu  cuccu 

Ne  swik  thu  naver  nu. 
Sing  cuccu  I  nu,  sing  cuccu ! 
Sing  cuccu  I  sing  cuccu,  nu  1 " 

In  the  romances  now  beginning  to  abound,  end-rhyme  was  used 
freely.  In  King  Horn  (1200-50)  sometimes  repetitions  answered 
the  purpose;  thus  in  lines  753-4  we  have 

'.'  J>at  him  scholde  londe  - 

In  Westene  londe," 
and  in  757-8 

"To  lond  he  him  sette 

And  f ot  on  stirop  sette ; " 


THE  SHAPING  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME          95 

but  for  the  most  part  the  lines  are  divided  into  two  three-stressed 
halves  by  ordinary  end-rhyme,  as  bltye :  ly$e ;  singe:  Huge; 
Horn :  born,  etc. 

The  six-stressed  line,  with  or  without  internal  rhyme,  narrowly 
escaped  becoming  the  normal  English  measure  at  this  period, 
especially  as  it  was  used  (without  internal  rhyme)  by  Robert  of 
Gloucester  (flourished  1260-1300)  with  distinguished  success. 
Indeed,  Robert  was  the  most  powerful  and  pleasing  English  end- 
rhymer  before  Chaucer.  His  alexandrines,  used  in  connection 
with  seven-stressed  lines,  have  a  fine  swing,  when  at  their  best ; 
and  if  the  strong  caesural  pause  becomes  rather  tiresome,  the 
genius  of  the  language,  then  in  an  experimental  state,  must 
be  blamed,  rather  than  the  poet.  Let  him  who  wishes  to  learn 
what  vigor  was  possible  in  rhymed  narrative  in  English  of  the 
thirteenth  century,  read  Robert  of  Gloucester's  story  of  Lear 
and  his  Daughters  straight  through. 

Robert  Manning,  or  Robert  of  Brunne,  who  wrote  between 
1290  and  1340,  was  the  author  of  Handling  Sin,  a  long  dull 
poem,  partly  translation,  partly  paraphrase,  and  partly  original. 
The  metre  is  of  the  roughest  and  the  literary  merit  of  the  smallest. 
Lines  have  four,  five,  six,  or  seven  stresses,  as  you  may  be  able  to 
count  them ;  and  the  swinging  regularity  of  Robert  of  Gloucester 
is  absent.  But  the  miscellany  is  interesting,  in  the  present  study, 
because  Manning  speaks  of 

"That  tyme 
That  I  began  thys  English  rhyme ; " 

and  because  he  mentions,  as  rhyme-forms  discarded  because  not 
easily  intelligible,  " ryme  couwee,"  "strangere,"  "entrelace,"  and 
"baston": 

"  I  made  it  not  for  to  be  praysed, 
Bot  at  pe  lewed  menn  were  aysed. 
If  it  were  made  in  ryme  couwee, 
Or  in  strangere  or  entrelace, 
pat  rede  Inglis  it  ere  inowe 
pat  couthe  not  haf  coppled  a  kowe, 
pat  outhere  in  couwee  or  in  baston 
Som  suld  haf  ben  fordon, 
So  pat  fele  men  pat  it  herde 
Suld  not  witte  howe  pat  it  ferde." 


96  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

"  Rime  couee  " — or  "  tail-rhyme,"  versus  caudati,  Schweifreim— 
meant  the  insertion  of  shorter  lines  rhyming  together  —  usually 
the  third,  sixth,  etc.  The  device  is  as  ancient  as  it  is  common, 
and  may  be  varied  in  almost  any  way,  being  closely  akin  to  the 
refrain.  The  resultant  merit  is  a  certain  variety;  the  corres- 
pondent demerit  is  a  hitchy  monotony  in  the  very  medium  intro- 
duced for  variety's  sake.  On  the  whole,  no  first-class  work  was 
ever  done  in  this  stanza;  and  Chaucer's  satire  at  its  expense, 
in  Sir  Thopas,  still  forms  its  just  obituary.  "Strangere"  and 
"baston"  are  of  unknown  meaning;  some  say  that  the  latter 
means  "stanza" ;  Saintsbury  calls  it  a  six-line  stanza  of  four  long 
and  two  short  lines ;  but  his  specimen,  ending  with  the  word  in 
question,  evidently  means  a  stanza,  not  the  particular  form. 
"Interlaced"  is  alternate. 

When  an  idea  is  bound  together  by  parallelism,  antithesis,  re- 
frain, or  even  the  completion  of  sense  which  a  rhymed  couplet 
gives,  the  idea-group  which  we  call  the  stanza  is  not  far  distant. 
Naturally,  therefore,  at  this  time  the  poem  entitled  TJie  Pearl 
(fourteenth  century)  uses  it  with  good  effect.  At  first  it  seems 
surprising  that  we  have  the  creation  of  a  twelve-line  stanza  in 
the  apparently  complicated  metre  ababababbcbc,  anticipating,  as 
it  were,  the  Spenserian  stanza  and  the  sonnet;  but  repeated 
rhymes  were  familiar,  centuries  earlier,  in  Proven9al  and  other 
languages ;  and  we  must  remember  that  English  could  now  look 
to  such  finished  models  as  the  Vita  Nuova  and  the  Divina  Corn- 
media.  Again,  we  are  in  Chaucer's  century ;  and  in  literature,  as 
in  physical  nature,  catastrophism  —  the  sudden  development  of 
long-slumbering  causes  —  must  be  taken  into  account. 

The  end-rhymes  in  The  Pearl  are  overlaid  by  an  elaborate 
system  of  alliteration,  which  distracts  attention  from  them.  Not 
even  the  later  mellifluousness  of  Surrey  and  Wyatt  could  make 
agreeable  the  combination  of  three  or  four  alliterations  in  each 
one  of  a  succession  of  end-rhymed  lines ;  and  the  author  of  The 
Pearl  was  no  Surrey.1  Alliteration,  our  most  ancient  form  of 

1  The  reader  should  be  referred,  however,  to  the  opinion  of  the  chief 
editor  of  the  poem,  Israel  Gollancz.  He  thinks  that  it  contains  an  im- 
portant and  beautiful  stanza-form,  without  known  models ;  and  that 
the  poem  virtually  constitutes  a  sonnet-sequence  at  a  very  early  day. 
Saintsbury  is  not  less  enthusiastic.  See  his  History  of  English  Prosody, 


THE  SHAPING  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME          97 

rhyme,  has  never  lost  its  beauty  and  value ;  but  its  nature  is  so 
strongly  assertive  that  it  does  not  comport  with  a  rival,  unless 
it  appear  in  moderation,  and  as  an  occasional  emphasis  or  adorn- 
ment. This  fact  Chaucer,  who  was  contemporary  with  the  au- 
thors of  The  Pearl  and  Sir  Gawaine  and  the  Green  Knight,  saw 
as  they  did  not.  The  best  touch  of  poetic  art  given  in  The  Pearl 
is  not  its  alliteration  or  end-rhyme,  but  its  employment,  to  an  ex- 
tent previously  unknown  in  English,  of  an  ingeniously  variant 
refrain. 

Before  Chaucer  and  the  subsequent  rule  of  end-rhyme  from 
his  day  to  ours,  William  Langland,  in  his  Vision  of  Piers  Ploivman, 
was  the  last  great  recurrer  to  the  methods  of  alliterative  English 
poetry,  —  because  he  was  the  last  singer  of  and  from  the  common 
people.  Almost  contemporary  with  Chaucer,  Langland  (1330  ?- 
1406  ?)  turned  toward  the  past,  while  Chaucer  led  the  way  for  all 
the  future.  The  transfer  from  alliteration  to  end-rhyme  had  come 
before  Langland's  day,  but  he  was  strong  enough,  both  as  thinker 
and  poet,  to  revive  the  old  rhyme  art  in  one  noble  strain.  Hence- 
forward, in  minor  romance  or  battle  ballad,  or  in  the  experiments 
of  the  scholastic,  it  might  lead  a  lingering  life,  but  its  day  was 
past,  save  as  an  adornment  of  its  triumphant  successor.  After 
the  Norman  conquest,  new  forces  from  the  rich  fields  of  Romance 
poetry  were  too  strong  to  be  resisted  in  England,  to  which  the 
door  of  the  Continent  was  now  wide  open.  The  poets  of  the 
thirteenth  and  fourteenth  centuries  did  not  hesitate  to  introduce 
French  words  whenever  they  pleased;  and  the  exigencies  of 
end-rhyme  enriched  the  language.  Latin  and  French,  further- 
more, combined  to  influence  English  to  use  the  stanza,  in  which 
end-rhyme  was  at  once  servant  and  master. 

Piers  the  Plowman  has  almost  every  merit  properly  to  be  de- 
manded of  a  folk-poem:  originality,  sincerity,  simplicity,  in- 
terestingness ;  and  the  alliteration,  being  in  full  possession  of  the 
field,  never  seems  forced  or  unwelcome.  Its  double  lines,  like 
those  of  Anglo-Saxon,  sometimes  have  four  stresses,  sometimes 
three.  The  freedom  of  the  verse  is  helped  by  the  survival  of 

107-9,  for  his  laudation  of  "the  most  charming  of  all  the  religious 
poems  of  this  time,"  "a  sort  of  carillon  —  not  indeed  of  joyful  but  of 
melancholy  sweetness  —  a  tangle,  yet  in  no  disorder,  of  symphonic 
sound,  running  and  interlacing  itself  with  an  ineffable  deliciousness,"  etc. 

7 


98  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

many  feminine  endings;  so  that  the  very  thing  which  aided 
Chaucer  in  his  couplets  was  of  service  to  Langland  in  the  older 
measure.  Couplets  do  not  appear  in  Piers  Plowman,  even  by 
accident;  the  author  seems  intentionally  to  have  avoided  them. 
The  fatal  fault  of  alliteration  —  the  sacrifice  of  sense  to  sound  — 
he  reduces  to  a  minimium  by  his  very  simplicity.  Whether  or  not, 
as  some  suppose,  there  was  in  existence  in  his  England  a  con- 
siderable body  of  popular  alliterative  verse,  now  lost,  he  con- 
stantly writes  as  one  in  easy  possession  of  his  instrument  and  his 
hearers.  If  his  was  the  swan-song,  we  may  be  thankful  that  it 
was  so  strong  and  full.  Langland  was  loyal  to  his  method,  and 
he  avoided  the  mongrel  notes  of  The  Pearl  and  other  exercises 
in  compound  rhyming.  In  him  we  have  right  words  in  right 
places;  not  sounds  summoned  to  match  other  sounds.  If  he 
lacks  the  variety  of  the  newly  found  stanza,  he  also  avoids  its 
monotony ;  for  the  stanza  is  sometimes  a  woeful  drag  on  prog- 
ress. Had  other  north  of  England  or  Scottish  poets  shared 
Langland's  genius,  alliteration  might  have  held  the  field  a  little 
longer;  its  ultimate  disuse  as  the  main  rhyme-mark,  in  the 
development  of  English  as  related  to  other  European  tongues, 
was  inevitable.  No  public  of  intelligence  could  long  endure  such 
stuff  as  Gavin  Douglas' 

f'Of  dreflyng  and  dremis  quhat  dow  is  it  to  endyt? 
For  as  I  lenyt  in  a  ley  in  Lent  this  last  nycht, 
I  slaid  on  a  swevynnyng  slummerand  a  lite : 
And  sone  a  selcouth  sege  I  saw  to  my  sycht, 
Swownand  as  he  suelt  wald,  soupit  in  site  — 
Was  nevir  wrocht  in  this  warld  mayr  wofull  a  wycht, 
Ramand,  ressoun  and  rycht  is  rent  by  falss  rite, 
Frendschip  flemyt  is  in  France,  and  fayth  hes  the  flycht, 
Leis,  lurdanry,  and  lust  ar  our  laid-stern; 

Pece  is  put  out  of  play, 

Welth  and  weilfare  away, 

Lufe  and  lawte  bayth  tuay, 
Lurkis  full  dern." 

Not  even  Langland  could  save  alliteration  by  such  fine  lines  as 
those  constituting  the  famous  beginning  of  his  poem : 

"  In  a  somer  sesun :  when  softe  was  the  sonne, 
I  schop  me  into  a  schroud :  a  scheep  as  I  were ; 
In  habite  of  an  hermite :  unholy  of  werkes, 
Wende  I  wydene  in  this  world :  wondres  to  here. 


THE  SHAPING  OF  ENGLISH  ^RHYME          99 

Bote  in  a  Mayes  morwynge :  on  Malverne  hulles 

Me  bifel  a  ferly :  a  feyrie,  me  thouhte ; 

I  was  weori  of  wandringe :  and  wente  me  to  reste  ] 

Undur  a  brod  banke :  by  a  bourne  syde, 

And  as  I  lay  and  leonede :  and  lokede  on  the  watre^, 

I  slumberde  in  a  slepyng:  hit  sownede  so  murie." 

With  the  passing  of  Langland  and  his  school,  and  with  the 
coming  of  Chaucer,  there  arises  the  still  vexed  question  of  the 
terminology  of  English  scansion.  As  one  approaches  it,  he 
finds  not  a  debatable  land,  but  confusion  worse  confounded.  So 
many  authorities,  so  many  systems.  There  are  no  feet  in  English, 
say  some.  Doctors  disagree  instantly  in  marking  any  consecutive 
four  lines  in  our  verse.  One  uses  the  entire  scheme  of  classical 
prosody;  another  rejects  it.  The  dactylic  movement  may  as 
well  be  called  anapaestic,  if  you  get  to  counting  it  that  way, 
just  as  the  sound  of  a  railway  train  is  either  one  two  three  one  two 
three,  or  one  two  three  one  two  three,  as  you  begin.  English 
entirely  lacks  quantity,  aver  some  confident  prosodists;  but  on 
the  other  hand  the  learned  A.  J.  Ellis,  the  investigator  of  early 
English  pronunciation,  gravely  sets  down  nine  varieties  of  stress, 
nine  degrees  of  length,  nine  of  pitch,  and  nine  of  silence.  This 
leads  the  equally  learned  J.  B.  Mayor  to  say  that  "life  is  not  long 
enough  to  admit  of  characterizing  lines  when  there  are  forty-five 
expressions  for  each  syllable  to  be  considered." 

Nearly  the  whole  truth  is  packed  into  these  admirable  words 
by  Mr.  Stedman,  who  had  an  advantage  not  possessed  by  most 
of  those  who  have  written  on  poetics  —  that  of  being  a  poet : 
"English  verse  is  characteristically  accentuate  instead  of  being 
quantitative  —  the  reverse  being  true  of  classical.  .  .  .  Although 
it  is  often  the  more  melodious  when  the  more  quantitative,  its 
quantity  is  incidental  and  derived  from  the  gift  of  the  poets; 
while  stress  of  accent,  as  differing  from  syllabic  length,  deter- 
mines its  metrical  system." 

In  other  words,  stress,  not  quantity,  is  the  basis  of  English 
verse;  foot,  line,  and  rhyme  must  follow  it.  Time,  quantity, 
stress,  accent,  beat,  all  plainly  exist  in  English  poetry,  and 
coincide  more  than  half  of  the  time  —  enough  to  give  the  law 
and  make  anything  else  the  exception.  The  first  line  of  Gray's 
Elegy  is  sufficient  to  show  this.  We  do  not,  and  cannot,  say 


100  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

"The"  curfew  tolls  the"  knell  6f  parting  day."  Hence,  for  con- 
venience, we  may  as  well  use  a  few  accepted  names  of  feet,  — 
spondee,  iambus,  anapaest,  trochee,  dactyl.  The  foot  has  been 
well  defined  as  "a  group  of  times  which  by  repetition,  with  or 
without  variation,  characterizes  and  measures  a  longer  series." 
But  we  must  always  remember  that  the  trained  ear,  not  rule,  is 
the  final  authority ;  we  must  proceed  inductively,  not  deductively. 
The  law  must  follow  the  product,  not  the  product  the  law.  The 
poet  does  not  begin  by  thinking  of  feet.  Taste,  the  cultivated  "I 
think  so,"  governs  both  metre  and  rhyme,  in  this  English  of  ours. 
Let  the  "thousand  warring  sects"  of  the  scansion-mongers  have 
their  way,  with  their  devices  for  recording  questionable  sounds ; 
but  do  not  forget  that  English,  in  all  its  splendid  freedom,  bears 
within  it  poetical  powers  as  great  and  as  varied  —  though  not 
the  same  —  as  those  of  any  other  language  in  which  man  ever 
sang.  Still,  it  is  chiefly  the  iambus  and  the  anapaest,  not  the 
trochee  and  the  dactyl, — the  "ascending, "not  the  "descending," 
rhythm  —  that  swing  the  lilt  of  our  song.  Swinburne  says  that 
English  is  "a  language  to  which  all  variations  and  combinations 
of  anapaestic,  iambic,  or  trochaic  [doubtless  he  includes  the 
trochaic  as  an  occasional  substitute]  metre  are  as  natural  and 
pliable  as  all  dactylic  and  spondaic  forms  of  verse  are  unnatural 
and  abhorrent."  We  cannot  admit  that  the  dactylic  and  spondaic 
movements  are  "unnatural  and  abhorrent" ;  but  must  recognize 
that  they  play  but  a  subordinate  or  occasional  part  in  English 
verse.  ^ 

In  form  as  in  spirit,  in  rhyme  as  in  poetic  creation,  Chaucer 
was  the  true  leader  of  our  song.  His  follower  Occleve  declared 
him  to  be  "the  first  fynder  of  our  faire  langage,"  while  a  recent 
writer  in  Blackwood's  Magazine  claims  that  he  "created  the 
noble  instrument  of  speech  which  can  hardly  be  matched  save 
in  ancient  Greece."  As  we  have  seen,  rhyme,  and  end-rhyme, 
were  no  invention  of  Chaucer's ;  but  no  Englishman  before  him 
had  rhymed  so  fluently,  so  variedly,  so  effectively;  and  in  no 
subsequent  English  poet  is  there  a  smaller  proportion  of  imper- 
fect or  objectionable  rhymes.  He  saw  that  the  iambic  pentameter 
was  the  indispensable  measure  in  English  verse;  by  none  of  his 
successors  has  it  been  better  applied  to  narration  and  description ; 


THE  SHAPING  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME        101 

with  French  models,  he  was  the  shaper  of  the  English  stanza; 
and  in  his  splendid  originality  he  made  us  forget  his  predecessors 
and  his  contemporaries. 

Perhaps  the  first  thing  to  attract  the  attention  of  students  of 
Chaucer's  rhymes  is  the  fact  that  in  his  practice,  as  in  Dante's 
(e.  g.,  Paradiso,  XIII,  89,  91)  identical  sounds  of  different 
meanings  form  permissible  rhymes,  as  in  lye  (rest) :  lye  (falsify) ; 
seke  (seek) :  seke  (sick).  In  Troilus  and  Cressida,  V,  104-5,  are 
mene  (noun)  and  mene  (verb) ;  while  in  The  Book  of  the  Duchesse, 
171-2,  are  song  (song) :  song  (singing). 

Rhymes  like  the  following  abound  in  Chaucer  (the  final 
syllable  of  course  being  stressed) : 

"That  speces  of  thynges  and  progressiouns  [-ouns] 
Shullen  enduren  by  successiouns "  (Knight's  Tale,  3013-4). 

So  disposicioun :  excucioun  ;  conclusioun :  confusioun  ;  queyntely : 
fetously;  pridelees :  rewthelees ;  giltelees,  etc. 

Something  of  the  pun  or  joke  strikes  the  modern  ear  in 

"Of  tymes  of  hem,  ne  of  the  causis 
For- why  this  is  more  than  that  cause  is  "  (House  of  Fame). 

and 

"  If  thou  noon  aske,  so  soore  artow  y-woundid 
That  verray  nede  unwrappeth  al  thy  wounde  hid  " 

(Man  of  Laws'  Tale). 

Such  rhymes  as  lyte  is:dytees;  vices:  vyce  is  illustrate  the 
indifference  to  minor  variations  in  vowel  sounds  which  has  charac- 
terized English  poetry  from  the  first,  and  which  prevents  nice 
deductions  concerning  pronunciation  from  rhymes  in  Chaucer  or 
any  other  of  our  poets.  Endings  such  as  vileynye:  cowardye; 
crye :  envye,  in  consecutive  lines,  are  unusual ;  but  in  the  stanza 
comprehended  in  lines  299-307  of  The  Compleynte  of  Faire 
Anelida  and  False  Arcite  the  rhymes,  in  order,  are  womanhede: 
dede :  nede :  lede :  drede :  bede :  mede :  sede :  hede. 

"For  curs  wol  slee,  —  right  as  assoiling  savith; 
And  also  war  him  of  a  Significavit"  (Prologue,  661-2). 

reminds  us  that  the  so-called  Roman  pronunciation  (v  like  w) 
was  not  in  vogue  in  Chaucer's  day. 


102  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

Chaucer  used  alliteration  as  an  ornament,  not  an  obligation. 
End-rhyme  was  henceforth  to  be  the  rule,  and  everything  else 
an  accessory.  Now  and  then  he  made  large  use  of  alliteration,  as, 
for  instance,  in  the  Knights  Tale,  1747  ff.  But  to  him  it  was 
neither  a  necessity  nor  an  aversion,  but  a  convenience.  The 
famous  words  of  the  Parson : 

"But  trusteth  wel,  I  am  a  Southren  man, 
I  can  nat  geste  —  rum,  ram,  ruf  —  by  lettre  " 

cannot  be  considered  as  anything  more  than  a  sign  that  allitera- 
tion, the  once  prevalent  rhyme-art,  had  passed  from  general  to 
forced  use,  especially  in  the  north. 

By  Chaucer,  as  by  Dante,  the  word  "rhyme"  was  sometimes 
used  as  synonymous  with  verse  in  general : 

"He  hath  bitrayde  folkes  many  tyme; 
Of  his  falshede  it  dulleth  me  to  ryme  " 

(Canon's  Yeoman's  Tale,  1092-3). 

Chaucer's  alleged  separation,  in  his  rhyme-groups,  of  vowels 
open  and  close,  or  long  and  short,  is  not  worth  extended  discus- 
sion, notwithstanding  the  deductions  of  over-confident  editors. 
Authorities  —  even  as  painstaking  as  Skeat  and  Ten  Brink — 
hopelessly  disagree ;  and  we  may  well  be  cautious  in  laying  down 
the  law  when  we  remember  present-day  variations  of  pronuncia- 
tion, on  the  part  of  persons  of  culture,  of  so  familiar  words  as 
therefore  and  wherefore.  Our  lack  of  absolute  knowledge  of  the 
range  of  sounds  given  by  Chaucer  to  any  vowel  is  too  great  to 
allow  dogmatism  as  to  his  rhyme-uses.  It  is  not  surprising  that 
the  latest  of  Chaucerian  critics  (R.  R.  Root,  A  Study  of  Chaucer, 
Boston,  1907)  concludes  that  "for  practical  purposes  it  may  be 
well  to  disregard  the  distinction  between  the  'open'  and  'close' 
sounds  of  e  and  o."  To  be  sure  of  Chaucer's  rhyming  of  e's  and 
o's  we  would  need 

1.  an  undoubted  text; 

2.  an  invariable  pronunciation  in  his  day  (Lydgate  was  appar- 
ently a  looser  rhymer  and  pronouncer  than  Chaucer) ; 

3.  an  unquestionable  knowledge  of  that  pronunciation,  five 
hundred  years  afterward; 


4.  a  certainty  that  Chaucer  intended  to  bind  his  rhymes  with 
absolute  strictness. 

The  wonder  is  that  he  apparently  made  so  little  variation  in 
rhyme-sounds;  but  let  us  not  be  sure  of  his  finer  sound-values 
until  we  are  certain  that  we  could  make  him  understand  our  own 
reading  of  a  page  of  his  poems. 

When  we  turn  to  the  larger  results  of  Chaucer's  rhyme-art,  we 
find  that  he,  for  the  first  time  in  English,  normally  used  the  five- 
stressed  iambic  rhythm,  in  rhymed  form,  —  blank  verse  being  a 
later  development.  Why  the  iambic  pentameter,  rhymed  or 
unrhymed,  is  the  great  English  line  is  not  easily  to  be  explained. 
But  it  is  of  a  length  sufficient  for  the  expression  of  a  complete 
thought  or  considerable  element  of  thought;  and  it  follows  the 
disposition  of  the  language  to  proceed  from  an  unstressed  unim- 
portant sound  to  a  stressed  important  one.  Again,  it  avoids  the 
sharp  caesura  in  the  middle  of  the  line,  which  is  akin  to  the 
genius  of  the  French  and  alien  to  that  of  the  English.  As  soon 
as  Chaucer  had  shown  the  commanding  suitability  of  this  meas- 
ure, the  hexameters  of  Robert  of  Gloucester  and  his  successors, 
down  to  Longfellow,  became  mere  tours-de-force. 

Chaucer's  use,  however,  was  not  limited  to  the  pentameter 
rhymed  couplet.  The  tetrameter  couplet  was  largely  employed 
by  him,  for  the  first  time  in  English,  and  in  The  Compleynte  unto 
Pile  and  Troilus  and  Cressida  he  used  the  rhyme-royal  or  seven- 
line  stanza,  rhymed  ababbcc.  This,  by  an  easy  modification, 
became  the  Spenserian  stanza,  which  will  be  considered  in  its 
proper  place.  In  the  ABC  and  the  Monk's  Tale  is  an  eight-line 
stanza :  ababbcbc  —  which,  again,  is  the  Spenserian  save  for  the 
ninth  alexandrine  c-line.  In  the  Compleynte  to  his  Lady  two 
stanzas  are  in  rhyme-royal,  and  then  Dante's  terza  rima  is  used 
(the  first  of  its  few  and  unsuccessful  appearances  in  English  verse), 
followed  by  a  ten-lined  stanza:  aabaabcddc.  In  the  Compleynt 
in  Anelida  and  Arcite  are  varying  stanzas  with  strophe  and 
answering  antistrophe.  In  the  ballade  form  of  Truth,  Gentilesse, 
and  Lack  of  Stedfastnesse  the  rhymes  of  the  first  seven-line  stanza 
are  repeated  in  several  stanzas.  Merciles  Beauty  is  a  French  triple 
roundel,  and  there  is  a  roundel  in  the  Parlement  of  Foules.  In  some 
of  these  are  twelve  rhyming  words,  without  loss  of  ease  in  effect. 


104  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

Chaucer  makes  large  use  of  feminine  endings,  made  necessary 
by  the  survival  of  the  e-termination,  which  was  the  remainder 
of  a  dozen  inflections  in  Anglo-Saxon.  In  rounding  out  his  lines, 
or  even  his  stanzas,  he  shows  easy  mastery  of  the  arts  of  finishing 
or  running-on,  as  the  case  demands. 

In  Anelida  and  Arcite  (272-80  and  333-41)  are  internal 
rhymes. 

"Cadence"  in  the  following  (House  of  Fame)  is  a  puzzle  to 
the  Chaucerians  (for  one  conjecture  see  Skeat's  edition  of  the 
works,  III,  257) : 

"And  neverthelesse  hast  set  thy  wyt 
(Although. that  in  thy  heed  ful  lyte  is) 
To  make  bookes,  songes,  or  dytees 
In  ryme  or  elles  in  cadence." 

Tone-color,  that  elusive  thing,  midway  between  the  highest 
aesthetic  fact  and  the  merest  imaginative  self-deception,  beauti- 
fully appears  in  the  "O  Alma  Redemptoris"  passages  of  The 
Prioress'  Tale,  in  the  key-phrase  of  which  Chaucer  introduced 
the  two  most  melodious  of  vowel-sounds,  o  and  a. 

Finally,  this  master  of  heroic  couplet,  octosyllabic  couplet, 
stanza,  and 

"many  an  ympne  for  your  halydayes, 
That  highten  Balades,  Roundels,  Virelayes  " 

(Legend  of  Good  Women,  422-3). 

illustrates  his  facile  knowledge  of  all  the  prosody  of  his  day  by 
the  jocose  Rime  of  Sir  Thopas,  so  swiftly  interrupted  by  the 
gentle  penalty  of  the  poet's  prose: 

"Here  the  Hoost  stynteth  Chaucer  of  his  Tale  of  Thopas: 

"'Na  moore  of  this,  for  Goddes  dignitee  !' 
Quod  oure  Hoste,  'for  thou  makest  me 
So  wery  of  thy  verray  lewednesse 
That,  also  wisly  God  my  soule  blesse, 
Min  eres  aken  of  thy  drasty  speche. 
Now  swich  a  rym  the  devel  I  biteche  I 
This  may  wel  be  rym  dogerel,'  quod  he. 
'Why  so,'  quod  I;  'why  wiltow  lette  me 
Moore  of  my  tale  than  another  man, 
Syn  that  it  is  the  beste  ryme  I  kan?' 
'By  God,'  quod  he,  'for  pleynly,  at  a  word, 
Thy  drasty  ryming  is  not  worth  a  toord; 


THE  SHAPING  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME        105 

Thou  doest  noght  elles  but  despendest  tyme ; 
Sire,  at  o  word,  thou  shalt  no  lenger  ryme. 
Lat  se  wher  thou  kanst  tellen  aught  in  geeste, 
Or  telle  in  prose  somwhat,  at  the  leeste, 
In  which  ther  be  som  murthe,  or  som  doctryne.' " 

No  pioneer  poet  of  any  language  can  show  in  his  verse-forms 
such  a  variety  of  commanding  and  influential  achievements.  It 
is,  accordingly,  amusing  to  remember  that  the  late  Professor 
Earle,  on  the  basis  of  the  well-known  lines  in  the  Compleynte  of 
Venus  (which  is  in  three  ballades,  with  one  envoy)  — 

"And  eek  to  me  hit  is  a  greet  penaunce, 
Sith  rym  in  English  hath  swich  scarsitee, 
To  folowe  word  by  word  the  curiositee 
Of  Graunson,  flour  of  hem  that  make  in  France  "  — 

gravely  assured  us  that  "  Chaucer  felt  the  difficulty  of  rhyming  in 
English;  he  could  not  keep  pace  with  the  French  rhymers." 
Chaucer  really  left  the  English  rhyme-art,  in  all  of  its  essen- 
tials, in  no  need  of  improvement. 

After  Chaucer,  not  the  deluge,  but  dwindling  rills.  Gower 
used  the  octosyllabic  couplet  with  fluency,  though  not  always 
with  poetic  beauty.  His  Confessio  Amantis  is  as  dull  and  wordy 
as  the  Ormulum,  without  Orm's  excuse  of  pioneer  toils,  and 
without  the  naive'te'  which  gives  the  Ormulum  a  certain  charm. 
Saintsbury  thinks  that  Gower's  octosyllables  were  written  con 
amore,  while  Chaucer's  were  written  against  the  grain ;  he  adds 
the  conjecture  that  Gower's  tetrameter  form  probably  influenced 
Wither,  possibly  Keats,  and  certainly  William  Morris,  "the 
actual  author  of  the  greatest  examples  of  it  in  English,  taking 
bulk  and  merit  together."  If  anybody  is  inclined  to  think  that 
Keats  was  influenced  by  Gower,  let  him  turn  from  Gower  to 
The  Eve  of  St.  Mark.1  There  is,  however,  a  curiously  Morris- 
like  swing  in  the  quotation  from  Gower's  Medea  story,  cited  by 
Saintsbury  (History  of  English  Prosody,  141). 

1  There  seems  to  be  something  unlucky  in  comments  on  this  metre, 
Mr.  R.  L.  Alden,  in  his  English  Verse,  says  that  "in  modern  English 
poetry  this  short  couplet  has  rarely  been  used  for  continuous  narrative 
of  a  serious  character,  except  by  Byron  and  Wordsworth,"  a  remark 
which  shows  how  easily  one  forgets  the  most  obvious  things  of  all,  such 
as  Marmion,  The  Lady  of  the  Lake,  The  Lay  of  the  Last  Minstrel,  and 
Snow-Bound. 


106  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

To  Puttenham  (1589)  Gower  was  especially  odious;  Putten- 
ham  goes  so  far  as  to  call  him  a  bungler  and  not  a  poet,  and  to 
say  that  "to  make  up  his  rhyme"  he  "would  for  the  most  part 
write  his  terminant  syllable  with  false  orthography,"  which  is, 
of  course,  a  great  exaggeration. 

Gower,  like  Chaucer,  rhymes  indentical  sounds  with  different 
meanings :  laste  (endure) :  laste  (end) ;  ungood :  good. 

In  the  fifteenth  century  spelling  and  pronunciation  were  in  so 
changeable  a  state  that  poets  were  both  advantaged  and  dis- 
advantaged  by  the  consequent  freedom  given  them.  In  Skelton 
one  finds  at  times  a  rudeness  of  rhymes  almost  as  wayward  as 
that  in  the  anonymous  ballads  of  bis  century,  and  amounting  to 
little  more  than  haphazard  assonance,  —  for  example,  gentle : 
mantle  ;  nept :  set :  violet ;  health :  wealth :  himself  ;  jug :  luck : 
chuck.  Skelton  put  on  record  the  fact  that  he  did  not  care 
whether  his 

"rime  be  ragged, 
Tattered  and  jagged, 
Rudely  raine-beaten, 
Rusty  and  moth-eaten," 

so  long  as  people  understood  and  liked  it;  and  his  rapidly  run- 
ning verse  bears  out  his  easy  theory.  But  his  "voluble  breathless 
doggerel,"  as  John  Churton  Collins  calls  it,  was  meant,  in  part, 
to  be  dramatic,  as  put  into  the  mouths  of  the  common  folk.  At 
its  worst  it  is  dull  and  clumsy;  at  its  best  it  shows  the  variety 
and  force  of  an  experimenter  seeking  greater  freedom  in  number 
of  accents,  in  internal  rhymes,  in  the  number  of  lines  ending  with 
the  same  rhyme,  ,and  in  novel  words.  Skelton  was  a  rude 
anticipator  of  Butler,  Barham,  and  Mahony. 

In  the  ballads  of  the  fifteenth  and  following  centuries,  as  in 
the  popular  sentimental  songs  and  music-hall  jingles  of  our  own 
day,  no  nicety  of  rhyme  was  asked  or  given ;  it  was  enough  that 
the  ear  be  caught  by  any  recurrent  similarity.  In  Barbara  Allen 
we  have  the  assonantal  dwellin' :  Allen  (compare  Scott's  Hel- 
vellyn :  yelling  and  Wordsworth's  sullen :  pulling) ;  in  Fair 
Helen  green :  e  'en :  tying  ;  in  Sir  Patrick  Spens  deep :  feet ;  mourn : 
storm;  in  The  Dragon  of  Wantley  warrant  ye:  Wantley ;  and  so 
on,  indefinitely.  In  the  gem  of  all  the  English  ballads,  A  Lyke 


THE  SHAPING  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME        107 

Wake  Dirge,  the  beauty  of  thought  and  word  is  such  that  even 
the  modern  reader  does  not  stop  to  notice  the  rhyme  passe :  last. 
Everything  was  subordinated  to  the  prime  requisite  of  a  lyric: 
the  effective  expression  of  feeling;  and  so  it  made  no  difference 
whether  there  were  the  prodigality  of  internal  rhyme,  or  scarcely 
any  good  rhyme  at  all ;  or  what  number  of  syllables  occurred  in 
the  line,  so  long  as  the  number  of  beats  was  usually  preserved. 
Coleridge's  insistence  that  the  line  should  be  measured  by  its 
stresses,  not  its  syllables,  was  anticipated  in  the  old  English 
ballads  over  and  over  again.  So,  too,  was  the  "common  metre" 
of  the  later  hymn- writers ;  virtually  a  seven-stressed  iambic  line, 
indifferently  with  or  without  rhymes  at  the  fourth  stresses.  It  was 
not  strange  that  the  ballads,  when  repopularized  by  Percy  and 
Scott,  were  the  very  groundwork  of  the  Romantic  revival  in  Eng- 
land at  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century.1  The  great  charm 
of  the  ballads  is  the  charm  of  all  romantic  poetry  in  English, 
when  at  its  best :  the  combination  of  unity  with  variety,  of  fixity 
with  freedom,  in  which  English  verse  is  supreme  in  all  literature. 

The  refrains  of  the  ballads  are  sometimes  bound  to  the  stanzas 
by  rhyme,  but  usually,  and  preferably,  not ;  for  the  refrain,  like 
Hebrew  parallelism,  is  in  itself  an  idea-rhyme. 

Perhaps  the  worst  constructive  fault  chargeable  against  the 
ballads  is  an  occasional  excessive  use  of  internal  rhyme,  which  so 
easily  degenerates  into  doggerel,  as  in  the  later  American  religious 
"classic"  of  the  seventeenth  century:  Michael  Wigglesworth's 
Day  of  Doom.  Internal  rhyme,  when  freely  used,  demands  the 
genius  of  a  Coleridge  or  a  Poe  to  make  it  endurable.  And  Cole- 
ridge and  Poe,  unlike  the  authors  of  the  Nutbrowne  Maide  and 
the  Day  of  Doom,  knew  enough  to  vary  it.  All  iterations,  too 
near  together,  become  wearisome  after  a  little,  like  Gawain 
Douglas'  "Vertew,  quhais  trew  sweit  dew  ouirthrew  al  vice"  or 
Swinburne's  "sad  bad  mad  glad"  Villon.  Tricks  should  be  con- 
cealed, not  magnified. 

1  Sometimes  the  modernness  of  old  folk-poetry  is  startling,  as  in  the 
beautiful  swing  of  a  stanza  from  the  part  of  Eve  in  a  Coventry  play : 
"Alas  that  ever  that  speech  was  spoken 

That  the  false  angel  said  unto  me ; 
Alas,  our  Maker's  bidding  is  broken, 
For  I  have  touched  his  own  dear  tree." 


VII 

THE  ELIZABETHANS  AND   THE   RHYME 
CONTROVERSY 

EVERY  reader  of  Palgrave's  Golden  Treasury  has  recognized,  a 
hundred  times,  the  appropriateness  of  giving  the  first  page  to 
Thomas  Nash's  poem  on  Spring.  In  its  artless  spontaneity  it 
suggests  the  first  song-sparrows,  twittering  on  the  trees  before 
the  snow  has  melted  beneath.  The  general  scansion  of  most  of 
the  lines,  if  you  must  hunt  it  out,  is  the  familiar  iambic  pentam- 
eter; but  the  start  is  a  trochee,  and  the  voice  falls,  here  and 
there,  into  three  strong  stresses  in  each  half-line,  the  caesura 
emphasized  by  the  prodigal  internal-rhymes.  It  is  the  very  ex- 
pression of  that  license  in  law  of  which  each  springtide  reminds 
us  anew: 

"Spring,  the  sweet  Spring,  is  the  year's  pleasant  king; 
Then  blooms  each  thing,  then  maids  dance  in  a  ring, 
Cold  doth  not  sting,  the  pretty  birds  do  sing, 
Cuckoo,  jug-jug,  pu-we,  to-witta-woo  ! 

Free  as  the  poem  is,  the  mono-rhymes  are  perfect,  according 
to  the  modern  standard,  with  the  exception  of  meet :  sit.  Nash's 
contemporaries,  however,  suggest  an  earlier  method.  In  Wyatt 
we  have  cruelty :  liberty :  extremity  ;  washeth :  departeth :  per- 
ceiveth :  plainetk :  fleeth :  appeareth :  feareth;  reason :  season :  con- 
dition:  fashion  ;  forgetfulness :  cruelness :  readiness:  fearfulness 
(in  every  case  the  accent  on  the  last  syllable).  If  Wyatt  and 
Surrey  had  had  their  way,  the  eye  would  have  had  as  much  to  do 
with  rhyme  as  the  ear.  Some  of  Wyatt's  lines  seem  to  the  modern 
reader  almost  unscannable.  Here,  for  instance,  is  a  part  of  his 
translation  of  Petrarch's  sixty-first  sonnet : 

"  I  will  not  m  my  grave  be  biirie'd, 

Nor  6n  my  t6mb  your  name  have  fixed  fast, 

As  cruel  cause  that  did  the  spirit  soon  haste 

From  th'  unhappy  bones,  b^  great  sfghs  stirre'd." 


ELIZABETHANS  AND  RHYME  CONTROVERSY     109 

If  anybody  is  dissatisfied  with  this  scansion,  let  him  make  his 
own.  Intelligibility  is  barely  saved,  but  beauty  is  lost. 

Wyatt  at  his  best,  though  no  Surrey,  was  a  poet ;  but  when  to 
Italianization  of  thought  he  added  every  kind  of  violation  of 
rhyme-accent,  the  result  is  not  "precious."  Also:  grow;  com- 
fort: sort;  are  natural  enough ;  sum:  doom;  leche :  wretch ;  alas: 
space;  last:  waste;  and  even  streams :  Thames :  dreams ;  are  to 
be  explained  by  the  pronunciation  of  his  time;  but  in  harbour: 
banner;  or  suffer:  displeasure,  as  well  as  in  some  of  those  already 
quoted,  it  is  easy  to  see  that  to  the  lingering  utterance  of  the  time 
Wyatt  undertook  to  add  the  idea  that  the  rhymer  was  privileged 
to  make  pronunciation,  so  long  as  the  lines  contained  the  re- 
quisite number  of  syllables.  Fortunately,  as  he  wrote  at  the 
beginning  of  a  great  period,  this  method  did  not  approve  itself 
to  other  poets.  Perhaps  his  most  astonishing  rhyme  is  contrary- 
ing  :  countre-weighing.  Once,  in  a  sonnet,  he  gives  the  un- 
expected assonance  y filed :  beguiled :  smiled :  misguided. 

Wyatt  experimented  with  the  terza  rima,  and,  as  usual  in 
English,  without  success.  The  metre,  in  our  ears,  has  no  unifying 
effect;  the  reader  or  hearer  goes  doubtfully  along,  uncertain 
where  the  rhymes  fall,  and  whether  he  is  given  ordinary  alternate 
rhymes  or  not.  Much  more  important  was  Wyatt's  service  in 
introducing  into  English  the  Italian  sonnet  and  ottava  rima 
(abababcc),  in  the  latter  of  which  he  was  pleasantly  successful. 
Later  poets,  however,  found  the  metre  less  capable  of  inclusive- 
ness  and  of  variation  than  the  similar  Spenserian  stanza,  and  it 
never  was  widely  used.  His  sonnets,  marred  by  the  artificial 
syllable-counting  and  wrenched  accents  just  mentioned,  are 
heavy  reading,  and  much  inferior  to  Surrey's.  An  original 
experiment  of  Wyatt's  was  what  Saintsbury  calls  "intertwisted 
decasyllabics"  (ababcbcdcdede,  etc.),  which,  as  the  same  authority 
says,  "has  more  the  effect  of  blank  verse  than  of  any  rhyme 
whatever."  The  English  ear  cannot,  or  will  not,  carry  changing 
rhymes  very  far.  With  the  exception  of  the  octave  of  the  sonnet, 
and  the  In  Memoriam  metre,  we  decline,  as  a  rule,  any  greater 
separation  or  longer  continuance  than  alternate  rhymes. 

Another  metre  of  Wyatt's  was  the  "poulter's  measure"  (alter- 
nate iambic  hexameter  and  iambic  heptameter)  rhymed  aabb, 


110  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

etc.  The  name  was  given  it  by  Gascoigne,  on  the  ground  that  it 
proffered  twelve  for  one  dozen  and  fourteen  for  another.  He 
calls  it,  exaggeratingly,  the  "commonest  sort  of  verse  which  we 
use  nowadays";  but  at  least  it  was  not  unfamiliar  to  the  minor 
versifiers  of  the  time.  Just  why  it  pleased  the  popular  ear  for  a 
while  is  hard  to  discover,  for  it  made  a  rule  out  of  what  was  an 
exception  in  Middle  English  ballad-chronicles,  and  seems  to 
belong  to  crude  rather  than  Italianized  days. 

It  is  glory  enough  for  Henry  Howard,  Earl  of  Surrey  —  the 
greatest  poet  from  Chaucer's  day  to  his  own,  to  say  that  he  was 
the  pioneer,  and  a  successful  one,  in  the  use  of  blank  verse  in 
English.  The  investigation  of  this  great  form  —  from  Surrey  to 
"Marlowe's  mighty  line,"  and  from  Marlowe  to  Tennyson's 
Idyls  of  the  King  —  does  not  belong  here.  It  is  enough  to  say 
that  Surrey's  translation  of  the  second  and  fourth  books  of  the 
Mneid  is  a  landmark  in  the  history  of  English  poetry. 

The  Italians  were  at  that  time  beginning  their  movement  to 
remand  rhyme  into  the  suburbs  of  their  good  pleasure,  as  a 
modern  and  rather  discreditable  thing,  in  comparison  with  un- 
rhymed  quantitative  verse  after  the  classical  Latin  model.  Hence 
the  unrhymed  Italia  Liber ata  of  Trissino,  etc,  in  versi  sciolti 
(freed  from  end-rhyme  and  depending  on  scansion) ;  and  hence, 
as  we  shall  see  presently,  the  great  onslaught  on  rhyme  by  a  very 
active  school  of  English  poets,  poetasters,  and  critics.  Just  how 
far  Surrey,  a  constant  student  of  Italian  models,  was  influenced 
by  them  in  his  use  of  blank  verse  is  difficult  to  say;  but  so 
sonorous  and  majestic  a  vehicle  for  poetic  thought  —  dramatic, 
philosophical,  and  even  narrative  —  was  bound  to  come.  It  is  at 
any  rate  improbable  that  Marlowe,  though  a  translator  from 
the  Latin,  was  influenced  by  the  anti-rhymers. 

Surrey,  like  Wyatt,  sometimes  counted  syllables  to  fill  the  verse, 
and  threw  forced  accents  on  syllables  unable  to  bear  it;  but 
in  both  faults  he  was  a  less  sinner  than  Wyatt.  He  did  not  rhyme 
-eth :-  eth,  -ing :  -ing,  or  -on :  -on.  Y  (indifferent  with  i  or  e}  rhymes 
of  course  occur  in  him,  and  have  come  down  through  the  cen- 
turies. A  few  of  his  more  unusual  rhymes  are  wolf :  gulph;  rest: 
beast;  assays :  ease ;  face :  alas  —  the  two  last  words  undoubtedly 
representing  the  same  pronunciation  in  his  day. 


ELIZABETHANS  AND  RHYME  CONTROVERSY     111 

The  gem  in  Surrey's  rich,  if  small,  volume  is  the  famous  allit- 
erative sonnet  on  Spring,  in  which  the  lingering  utterance 
belonging  to  most  descriptive  and  meditative  verse  makes  en- 
joyable even  the  unusual  accent  of  his  day  and  school : 

"The  soote  season,  that  bud  and  bloom  forth  brings, 

With  green  hath  clad  the  hill  and  eke  the  vale : 
The  nightingale  with  feathers  new  she  sings ; 

The  turtle  to  her  mate  hath  told  her  tale. 
Summer  is  come,  for  every  spray  now  springs : 

The  hart  hath  hung  his  old  head  on  the  pale; 
The  buck  in  brake  his  winter  coat  he  flings; 

The  fishes  flete  with  new  repaired  scale. 
The  adder  all  her  slough  away  she  slings; 

The  swift  swallow  pursueth  the  flies  smale ; 
The  busy  bee  her  honey  now  she  mings; 

Whiter  is  worn  that  was  the  flowers'  bale. 
And  thus  I  see  among  these  pleasant  things 
Each  care  decays,  and  yet  my  sorrow  springs." 

At  this  period  of  almost  universal  curiosity,  novelties  in  verse 
were  appearing  on  every  hand:  now  imported  from  Italy,  and 
now  invented  —  like  Nash's  pretty  poem  —  by  the  very  prodigal- 
ity of  freshly-singing  genius.  Thus  we  have  Turberville  writing 
eighteen-line  stanzas,  partly  in  dimeters,  and  with  pleasure: 
treasure :  leisure :  measure-rhymes  that  seem  a  century  away 
from  Wyatt's  heavy  endings.  Turberville  also  had  the  originality 
to  rhyme  aaaxbbbx,  the  intentional  abandonment  of  rhyme 
making  a  good  because  unexpected  finish,  especially  as  coming 
at  the  end  of  the  shorter  lines. 

Spenser,  the  "poet's  poet,"  the  creator  of  what  Taine  calls  a 
"phantasmagoria,"  was  a  master-rhymer  in  two  ways :  the  mellif- 
luous felicity  of  his  rhymes  themselves,  and  the  skill  with  which 
they  were  made  the  means  of  binding  verses  together  in  beauti- 
fully unified  stanzas,  of  which  the  "Spenserian," — that  fine 
expansion  of  the  rhyme  royal  and  the  ottava  rima,  is  of  course  the 
chief.  It  is  out  of  fashion  now,  but  as  long  as  English  poetry  is 
read  it  will  hold  its  place,  not  only  in  Spenser  himself  but  also  in 
Thomson  and  now  and  then  in  Byron.  Its  other  users  failed 
fully  to  catch  its  art.  I  will  not  enrich  these  pages  with  needless 
specimens ;  turn  to  your  Spenser,  take  the  Faerie  Queene  to  the 
brookside,  and  sit  down  and  yield  to  the  charm  of  the  musical 
steady  flow. 


112  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

Spenser  knew  the  rhyme-advantage  of  a  long  and  sometimes 
variant  burden,  as  in  the  "That  all  the  woods  may  answer,  and 
your  echo  ring"  of  the  Epithalamion,  or  the  "Sweet  Thames,  run 
softly,  till  I  end  my  song"  of  the  Prothalamion.  His  sonnets,  in 
two  forms,  are  inferior  to  many  produced  by  his  contemporaries, 
even  by  men  of  an  ability  much  inferior  to  his  own.  As  good  as 
any  is  "One  day  I  wrote  her  name  upon  the  strand"  (in 
ababbcbccdcdee  form).  This  interlacing  destroys  both  the  Italian 
and  the  Shakespearean  schemes;  but  Spenser,  who  invented  it, 
sometimes  so  uses  it  as  to  preserve  the  sonnet-unity  in  a  nice  way. 

It  seems  almost  inexplicable  that  this  master  of  rhyme  should 
have  joined,  though  not  very  effectively,  in  the  Elizabethan  attack 
on  the  art ;  and  that  the  creator  of  what  has  been  called  the  most 
perfect  of  all  stanzas  should  have  turned  out  unrhymed  alleged 
hexameters  that  would  discredit  a  fairly  bright  schoolboy  to-day. 

Regarding  the  externalities  of  rhyme,  he  employed,  but  not 
often,  feminine  endings,  and  sometimes  forced  the  final  accent  so 
that  it  fell  upon  this  or  that  syllable  of  the  closing  word ;  but  this 
license  is  far  less  common  than  in  Wyatt,  or  even  in  Surrey.  Of 
identical  rhymes  one  finds  stor'd:  stor'd:  restor'd;  play  (verb): 
play  (noun);  night :  knight ;  ornament:  monument.  At  one  ex- 
treme we  have  girldnd:  riband;  and  at  the  other  perfection:  in- 
f Action  (at  the  ends  of  pentameters).  The  following  illustrate 
differences  in  pronunciation  between  his  day  and  ours :  —  gras : 
was;  cast:plast  (placed);  heate:  threate;  envy:  spy;  wars: 
years.  But  in  the  following  the  pronunciation  is  sundered: 
mourne:  learne;  cherisht :  florisht.  Spenser  sometimes  resorted 
to  dialectal  forms  for  rhyme-exactness ;  e.  g.,  swim :  dim  (climb) ; 
jawes :  wawes  (waves) ;  grieffe :  clieffe.  Assonance  is  found  in 
deckt:set;  strains :  became  ;  shepherd :  bettered. 

The  remark  is  not  exactly  germane  to  the  present  discussion ; 
but  I  cannot  dismiss  Spenser  without  reminding  the  reader  that 
the  author  of  the  greatest  English  narrative  poem  after  Chaucer 
could  not  scan  the  Canterbury  Tales,  but  entirely  missed  the 
measure,  trying  to  make  the  Prologue  go  in  four  feet  because  he 
did  not  understand  the  final  e. 

Examples  of  rhyme-freedom  abound  in  the  poets  of  the  period. 
Drummond  has  prescrib'd :  depriv'd.  The  anonymous  Elizabethan 


ELIZABETHANS  AND  RHYME  CONTROVERSY     113 

lyrics  are  almost  as  wayward  —  and  for  the  same  reason  —  as  the 
ballads  of  the  previous  century.  In  them  we  find  bitter:  sweeter; 
else :  excels  ;  there :  sphere  ;  surpass :  was  ;  remorse :  force  ;  fast : 
waste;  have:  save;  do:  so;  dainty :  beauty ;  meadows :  willows ; 
do  you :  wi'  you.  Some  of  these  are  once-current  pronunciations  ; 
some  are  permissible  stretchings  of  vowels ;  some  are  assonances. 
Sidney's  one :  groan  was  current  vowel-use ;  but  his  peace : 
release :  press :  cease  shows  that  he,  like  almost  all  English  poets 
who  have  ever  written,  was  willing  to  force  the  sound  under  the 
necessities  of  multiplying  rhymes.  He  gives  love :  prove,  as 
Marlowe  love :  move.  Love,  in  the  sixteenth  century,  was 
probably  luv;  but  whatever  its  pronunciation  at  any  time,  the 
poets  have  been  compelled  to  treat  it  liberally,  on  account  of  its 
necessity  as  an  expression,  and  its  few  rhyming  companions,  on 
any  theory  of  utterance. 

Herrick,  who  was  virtually  an  Elizabethan,  though  he  wrote  in 
the  seventeenth  century,  was  generally  as  accurate  as  any 
modern  rhymer,  though  of  course  some  of  his  old  pronunciations 
make  readers  pause.  His  come :  home  appears  in  Scott,  Moore, 
and  Emerson,  —  home  being  almost  in  the  position  of  love,  as 
regards  its  rhyming  necessities.  Pope,  it  may  be  remarked  by 
the  way,  has  dome :  come ;  and  Dryden  home :  plum  and  home : 
comb :  gum.  Lark :  clerk,  in  Herrick,  survives  in  England  but 
not  in  the  United  States.  No  theory  really  justifies  his 

."Some  ask'd  me  where  the  rubies  grew; 

And  nothing  did  I  say, 
But  with  my  finger  pointed  to 
The  lips  of  Julia." 

A  chapter  might  be  given  to  Herrick  as  true  poet  and  facile 
rhymester.  I  will  only  quote  a  stanza  from  his  clever  iambic 
monometer  Upon  his  Departure  Hence : 

."Thus  I 
Pass  by 

And  die 
As  one 
Unknown 

And  gone." 

Crashaw  and  Cowley,  too,  seem  to  belong  with  the  Elizabethan 
choir.  In  the  Wishes  for  the  Supposed  Mistress  of  the  former  we 

8    , 


114  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

have  great  freedom  —  lie :  eye :  destiny  ;  birth :  forth :  earth  ; 
wishes :  blisses :  kisses  ;  beauty :  duty :  shoe-tie  ;  up :  shop :  ope  ; 
here :  clear :  character;  this  is :  wishes :  kisses ;  glory :  before  ye : 
story.  Here,  as  so  often,  jocosity  leads  to  rhyme-freedom.  In 
his  pronunciation  survived  the  sixteenth-century  perfect  rhyme 
now :  you. 

Cowley  has  envy' 'd:  side;  one:  legion  (on  in  both  words); 
sought :  vault  and  sought :  fault  (old  dropping  of  the  /  sound) ; 
come:  home  (see  above);  heat:  great;  yet:  bit.  His  tell  .'un- 
speakable suggests  the  nineteenth-century  pre-Raphaelites,  or 
Whittier's  "Pisa's  leaning  miracle,"  rhyming  with  tell. 

In  Crashaw's  know :  no  we  have  a  late  survivor  of  the  old 
custom,  so  often  mentioned. 

Herbert  has  one  poem  (Easter  Wings)  in  the  shape  of  alleged 
wings,  and  another  (The  Altar)  in  the  form  of  a  table  with  central 
pillar,  supporting  a  mensa.  On  the  whole,  his  verse-tricks, 
among  which  appears  an  anagram  in  shocking  taste,  seriously 
impair  the  pleasure  taken  by  the  modern  reader  in  the  work  of  one 
who,  in  occasional  thought  and  phrase,  was  certainly  a  true  poet. 
Herbert  makes  frequent  use  of  short  rhyming  lines,  and  in  one 
case  (Heaven)  he  employs  the  echo  device : 

f  Oh  who  will  show  me  those  delights  on  high? 
Echo:  I,"  etc. 

In  Paradise  the  rhymes  of  the  successive  stanzas  drop  a  letter 
after  the  first  line:  Grow :  row :  ow;  charm :  harm :  arm ;  start: 
tart:  art;  spare:  pare:  are;  friend:  rend:  end.  Thrown:  stone: 
one,  in  the  Sepulchre  poem,  proves  the  long  o  pronunciation  of 
one  in  Herbert's  day.  Venture:  centre  indicates  the  contem- 
porary sound  of  the  former  word.  In  the  Jesu  poem,  in  which, 
according  to  the  whimsical  fashion  of  the  time,  the  title- 
word  is  resolved  into  "I  ease  you,"  the  characters  I  and  J 
are  used  interchangeably,  as  is  shown  by  the  rhyme  J: 
instantly. 

A  curiosity  in  Herbert  —  unmatched  elsewhere,  as  far  as  I 
know  —  is  the  significance  given  to  a  rhyme-word  by  its  delib- 
erate transference  from  its  proper  place  (in  the  last  stanza 
of  Home): 


ELIZABETHANS   AND   RHYME  CONTROVERSY    115 

"  Come,  dearest  Lord,  pass  not  this  holy  season, 

My  flesh  and  bones  and  joints  do  pray: 
And  even  my  verse,  when  by  the  rhyme  and  reason 
The  word  is  Stay,  says  ever,  Come. 
Oh  show  thyself  to  me, 
Or  take  me  up  to  thee  I" 

The  Elizabethan  lyrists  so  used  end-rhyme  as  to  give,  in  a  great 
variety  of  forms,  a  combined  pleasure,  as  of  the  best  Italian  art 
and  the  truest  English  freedom.  The  range  is  long  and  the 
achievement  high.  To  the  general  division  belong  masterpieces 
as  far  apart  as  Shakespeare's  "Poor  soul,  the  centre  of  my  sinful 
earth"  —the  highest  personal  expression  he  ever  gave  the 
world;  his  tripping  three-stressed  "Crabbed  age  and  youth"; 
his  tender  "Fear  no  more  the  heat  o'the  sun" ;  Lodge's  Shelley  an 
"Like  to  the  clear  in  highest  sphere";  Constable's  "Diaphenia 
like  the  daffadowndilly,"  where  the  syllables  scamper  to  catch 
the  metre,  in  the  very  sport  of  joyousness ;  Wyatt's  best  poem, 
"Forget  not  yet  the  tried  intent,"  with  its  simply  effective  re- 
frain ;  Barnefield's  "As  it  fell  upon  a  day" ;  and  the  stately  eight- 
een-line  groups,  half  stanza,  half  strophe,  of  the  Prothalamion. 

In  regard  to  the  rhymes  of  Shakespeare,  an  interesting  and 
patient  study  of  the  subject  has  been  made  by  the  German 
phonologist  Wilhelm  Victor,  with  the  intention  of  determining 
the  pronunciation  of  the  poet.  He  has  classified,  by  evident  or 
supposed  sounds,  all  the  rhymes  in  the  poems,  and  has  prefixed 
to  his  phonetic  dictionary  thereof  an  elaborate  discussion  of  the 
questions  involved,  with  many  allusions  to  rhymes  in  the  plays. 

Here,  as  in  all  delicate  questions  of  pronunciation  from 
Chaucer's  day  to  ours,  uncertainties  confront  one  at  every  step. 
Victor's  own  ear,  as  shown  by  his  phonetic  devices  and  tables  of 
sounds,  does  not  invariably  seem,  to  the  English  student,  suffi- 
ciently trustworthy  to  enable  him  to  determine  close  differences 
which  to  many  appear  imperceptible  or  imaginary.  "What," 
indignantly  exclaimed  a  Scotch  divine  transferred  to  a  New  York 
pulpit,  —  when  his  more  Americanized  daughter  was  endeavoring 
to  correct  his  dialectal  pronunciation  of  the  word  in  question,  — 
"what  is  the  dufference,  anyway,  between  dufference  and  duf- 
ference?" 

Most  of  Victor's  suggestions  do  not  affect  the  essential  quality 


116  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

of  the  rhyme  at  all ;  and  his  nice  arrangements  of  closely  pairing 
sounds,  though  some  of  them  are  unquestionable,  are  offset  in 
Shakespeare,  as  in  nearly  every  English  poet,  by  other  rhymes  in 
which  he  evidently  cared  for  nothing  save  a  general  similarity. 
The  book,  however,  is  a  valuable  finding-list,  and  must  grate- 
fully be  accepted  as  a  body  of  salient  suggestions.  To  it  the 
interested  student  may  turn  for  himself;  only  a  few  points  can 
be  considered  here. 

Victor  deems  significant  the  rhyming,  by  themselves,  of  aim, 
exclaim,  maim,  as  over  against  the  separate  group  of  blame,  came, 
dame,  defame,  fame,  frame,  inflame,  lame,  name,  same,  shame,  and 
tame.  That  is,  he  thinks  that  Shakespeare  differentiated  between 
modern  simple  long  a  in  blame  and  a  semi-diphthongal  ai  in  aim 
("a  in  can  followed  bye  in  be")  —  as  also  in  aid,  etc.  But  the 
New  English  Dictionary  gives  ei  for  both  blame  and  aim;  the  list 
of  aim-rhymes  is  too  short  to  prove  much ;  and  we  have  dame : 
remain  in  The  Passionate  Pilgrim.  Such  uncertainties  in  the 
crucial  points  of  Victor's  arguments  —  even  in  the  poems,  more 
accurately  rhymed  than  the  rhyming  lines  in  the  plays  —  tend  to 
throw  us  back  upon  A.  J.  Ellis's  conclusion  that  Shakespeare's 
puns  and  rhymes  illustrate  nothing  save  his  general  way  of 
speech,  and  cannot  enable  us  to  reconstruct  a  system  of  Eliza- 
bethan phonetics.  One  or  two  such  rhymes  as  wretch, :  scratch  or 
neck :  back  (Venus  and  Adonis)  offset  a  hundred  alleged  niceties 
elsewhere. 

Lined: mind:  wind:  Rosalind,  in  As  You  Like  It,  are  made  I 
by  Victor  and  81  by  Sweet  and  Ellis ;  but  in  Love's  Labor 's  Lost 
we  have  Longaville :  compile  and  Longaville :  ill,  indifferently. 
So  long  as  the  letter  is  the  same  or  the  sound  somewhat  similar, 
Shakespeare  cares  little  for  the  second  rhyming  word;  thus  we 
have  quickly :  unlikely ;  enrich' d:  beseech' d;  shift:  theft;  wit: 
yet;  imprinted :  contented ;  spirit :  merit ;  commission :  impres- 
sion. Such  cases  as  these  Victor  frankly  recognizes  as  not  being 
close  rhymes ;  indeed,  he  once  states  that  his  general  contention 
is  only  that  Shakespeare  used  a  greater  number  of  "perfect" 
rhymes  than  is  generally  supposed.  The  percentage  of  perfect 
rhymes  in  Shakespeare  is  smaller  than  in  Chaucer,  but  larger 
than  in  such  a  modern  romantic  poet  as  Keats. 


ELIZABETHANS  AND  RHYME  CONTROVERSY     117 

Shakespeare's  groin :  swine  suggests  the  universal  eighteenth- 
century  pronunciation  of  join,  toil,  etc.,  as  a*.  Probably 
Shakespeare's  joined:  coined;  boil:  spoil  and  foiled:  toiled  were 
also  9i. 

On  the  old  monosyllabic-dissyllabic  fire:  higher  question, 
Shakespeare  throws  no  light  save  in  the  rhymes  relier :  desire ; 
relier :  retire. 

Are:  care  and  were:  appear  remind  'us  that  er  and  wzr  are 
probable  Shakespearean  pronunciations.  A  and  e,  in  a  long  list 
of  similar  words,  have  always  been  in  an  uncertain  state.  The 
same  remark  may  be  made  of  granting :  wanting.  Wanting  (a) 
is  probably  Shakespearean;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  a  recent 
American  phonetician  gives  9  for  grant  as  the  present  normal 
pronunciation.  Rhyme,  after  all,  goes  but  a  short  and  uncertain 
way  as  a  guide  to  pronunciation.  Been:  seen  (i)  and  rather: 
father  (a)  are  heard  in  twentieth-century  England ;  while  in  the 
United  States  one  hears  been:  sin  (i)  and  rather:  gather  (se). 
Thomas  Lovell  Beddoes,  in  one  of  his  letters,  says  that  "the  best 
use  of  rhyme  is  that  it  teaches  pronunciation";  but  if  no  half- 
dozen  people,  even  in  the  same  environment,  may  be  trusted  to 
pronounce  literature,  news,  girl,  water,  in  precisely  the  same  way, 
how  can  we  dogmatize  when  we  undertake  to  settle,  by  their 
rhymes,  the  pronunciation  of  Chaucer  and  Shakespeare  ?  When 
intentional  variability,  which  we  have  found  from  the  first  use 
of  end-rhyme,  is  added  to  this  difficulty  of  establishing  even 
contemporary  speech  on  any  basis  of  phonetic  unity,  it  behooves 
us  to  be  modest. 

The  /  in  balk  had  perhaps  disappeared  in  Shakespeare's  day, 
and  he  rhymes  balk:  hawk.  But  he  also  has  the  surprising 
assonantal  rhyme  talk:  halt. 

Leap :  reap  appears  but  once  in  the  poems,  and  leaps :  steps 
once;  in  Merry  Wives  is  leap:  unswept  —  suggestive  of  the 
modern  dialectal  preterite  swep  ("he  swep  the  crossink"  — 
Thackeray's  Yellowplush).  Dread:  bed  and  dreadeth :  leadeth 
also  illustrate  Shakespeare's  constant  indifference  in  the  use  of  ea 
and  e.  Great  rhymes  with  defeat  and  get,  and  greater  with  better. 
Eats :  gets  reverses  the  tense  of  Milton's  feat :  eat  (preterite) ;  but 
the  pronunciation  and  orthography  of  eat,  in  the  present  and  past 


118  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

tenses,  have  been  shaky  for  three  centuries.  Defeated :  created, 
as  Victor  says,  "looks  like  an  eye-rhyme." 

Interesting,  in  one  way  or  another,  are  publisher :  singular : 
orator;  enter :  venture ;  departure :  shorter ;  heard :  regard ;  art: 
convert;  read  (present  tense) :  indeed,  and  also  o'er-read:  (present) 
dead;  again:  brain,  and  also  again:  pen;  grapes:  mishaps; 
water :  flatter  ;  dally :  folly  ;  moan :  upon  ;  noon :  son  ;  adder : 
shudder. 

Shakespeare  pronounced  o  in  almost  any  way :  e.  g.,  roaming : 
coming;  no  man:  woman;  Rome:  room;  Jove:  love;  man:  one; 
one :  shoon  ;  noon :  son  ;  store :  poor ;  propose :  lose  ;  sycamore : 
hour.  Still  greater  indifference  is  shown  by  daughter :  slaughter 
and  daughter:  after,  while  elsewhere  are  caught  her:  slaughter: 
halter. 

Finally,  of  queer  rhymes,  sometimes  mere  assonance,  we  have 
blemish:  replenish;  remember' d:  tender' d;  empty:  plenty;  be- 
time:  Valentine;  him:  win;  dooms:  moons;  come:  sung;  open: 
broken;  teeth:  with;  and  the  astonishing  only  in:  6f  good  women, 
which  has  caused  the  commentators  to  sit  up  o'  nights. 

Shakespeare,  in  general,  observed  the  usual  prosodic  and 
melodic  laws  of  his  day.  He  was  at  the  farthest  remove  from 
deserving  the  remark  of  a  recent  critic  that  "Shakespeare,  that 
royal  libertine,  could  not  be  expected  to  reverence  the  laws." 
Save  as  he  treated  English  rhyme  as  a  free,  not  a  fettered,  thing 
he  was  orderly  throughout.  To  his  rhymes  he  gave  full  value. 
Even  in  his  eccentricities  he  was  not  the  most  wayward  of  the 
Elizabethans.  Alliteration  is  moderately  used;  he  knew  the 
unwisdom,  in  an  age  devoted  to  end-rhyme,  of  carrying  "raging 
rocks  and  shivering  shocks"  too  far.  Thought-rhyme  and  tone 
color  appear  everywhere,  as  needed. 

The  fact  that  rhymes  and  "end-stopped"  lines  occur  much 
more  frequently  in  the  earlier  plays  than  in  the  later  is  too  well 
known  to  need  amplification,  even  in  a  study  of  English  rhyme. 
In  Love's  Labor 's  Lost  there  are  two  rhymed  lines  to  one  of  blank 
verse.  In  The  Comedy  of  Errors  there  are  380  rhymed  lines  and 
1150  unrhymed;  in  The  Tempest  only  two  rhymed  lines;  in  A 
Winter's  Tale  none  (Dowden).  The  same  student  reminds  us 
that  A  Midsummer  Night's  Dream,  III,  i,  169-77,  is  all  rhyme 


ELIZABETHANS  AND  RHYME  CONTROVERSY     119 

(it  is  monorhyme) ;  that  Richard  III  was,  more  than  any  other 
of  the  plays,  "under  the  influence  of  the  great  master  of  blank 
verse,  Marlowe" ;  that  "in  so  late  a  play  as  Othello  Shakespeare 
introduces  rhyme  to  fulfil  a  special  purpose  when  he  sees  fit" 
(e.g.,  I,  iii,  201-19;  II,  i,  141-69);  that  "in  All's  Well  rhyme 
is  employed  as  a  vehicle  for  generalizing  reflections";  and  that 
blank  verse,  run-on  lines,  and  light  endings  increased  as  Shake- 
speare gained  in  mastery. 

In  the  plays  rhyme  is  used  to  mark  ends  of  scenes,  or  "  asides," 
to  be  noticed  by  the  audience.  E.  A.  Abbott  (Shakespearean 
Grammar)  says  that  Shakespeare  uses  prose  for  comic  scenes, 
letters,  etc.,  "where  it  is  desirable  to  lower  the  dramatic  pitch"; 
for  colloquial  parts ;  for  frenzy  (Othello,  IV,  i,  34-44) ;  for  mad- 
ness (Lear,  IV,  vi,  130);  and  for  "the  higher  flights  of  the 
imagination"  (Hamlet,  II,  ii,  310-20). 

Sometimes  Homer  nods,  and  sometimes  Shakespeare  writes  the 
poorest  of  prose  in  rhymed  form,  e.  g. : 

f  Do  not  say  so,  Lysander,  say  not  so, 
What  though  he  love  thy  Hermia?    Lord,  what  though?" 

A  curious  variation  for  the  sake  of  the  rhyme  is  to  be  found  in 
the  well-known  song  in  Much  Ado,  where  (First  Folio)  one 
stanza  begins  "Sigh  no  more,  ladies,  sigh  no  more,"  rhyming 
with  shore;  and  the  next  "Sing  no  more  ditties,  sing  no  mo," 
rhyming  with  so. 

The  Shakespearean  sonnet  (ababcdcdefefgg)  is  undoubtedly 
inferior  to  the  Italian  in  form,  and  is  really  three  four-line  stanzas 
and  a  two-line  coda.  But  Shakespeare  made  it  the  vehicle  of 
some  of  the  noblest  and  most  beautiful  of  his  thoughts ;  he  never 
wrote  anything  greater  than  Sonnet  CXLVI.  Sonnet  XCIX 
has  fifteen  lines,  rhyming  ababacdcdefefgg ;  and  CXXVI  twelve, 
rhyming  aabbccddeeff  —  really  not  a  sonnet  at  all,  but  six  heroic 
couplets.  Sonnet  XX  is  in  feminine  rhymes  alone,  —  a  device 
successful  here,  by  intention,  but  one  which  the  author  did  not 
repeat.  In  general,  Shakespeare's  success  in  giving  a  true  sonnet- 
effect,  while  discarding  the  Italian  plan  of  making  a  statement  in 
the  octet  and  an  application  in  the  sextet,  is  a  constant  surprise, 
coming  as  it  did,  at  a  time  when  Italian  influences  were  para- 


120          A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

mount.  A  certain  similarity  —  of  application  or  climax  —  may 
naturally  be  found  between  the  closing  couplets  of  the  sonnets 
and  those  of  Shakespeare's  six-line  stanzas  (ababcc)  in  Venus  and 
Adonis,  or  the  rhyme  royal  (ababbcc)  of  The  Rape  of  Lucrece. 

Shakespeare's  rhymes  fairly  cover  those  of  his  contemporaries, 
which  need  not  here  be  discussed  in  extenso.  As  regards  rhyme, 
there  was  a  large  similarity  among  the  Elizabethan  writers, 
looking  back,  as  they  did,  to  Chaucer  and  forward  to  Dryden. 
Italian  influences,  and  necessary  lyrical  freedom,  affected  verse- 
forms  rather  than  rhyming  uses.  Marlowe's 


or  his 


f'By  shallow  rivers,  to  whose  falls 
Melodious  birds  sing  madrigals," 


"The  shepherd  swains  shall  dance  and  sing 
For  thy  delight,  each  May  morning," 


would  not  have  been  foreign  to  Keats  or  Shelley;  while  the 
correct  but  rather  wooden  heroic  couplets  of  his  Hero  and  Leander 
did  not  differ  from  eighteenth-century  work,  save  that  the  rhymes 
were  somewhat  less  forced.  Out  of  82  consecutive  lines  in  this 
poem  the  only  ones  not  absolute,  in  our  modern  speech,  are 
blood: stood;  throne: upon;  none: moan;  sphere : there ;  wand: 
hand;  taste:  surpast;  tell  ye:  belly;  suffice:  eyes;  his:  kiss; 
and  at  least  three  of  these  were  probably  correct  according  to 
the  pronunciation  of  his  time. 
Marston's  wretched 

f'But,  Punicus,  of  all  I  '11  bear  with  thee, 
That  fain  would  be  thy  mistress'  smug  monkey" 

illustrates  the  point  that  lingering  or  forced  rhymes  do  not  befit 
unimportant  syllables  or  mean  words. 

Jonson's  wishing:  kissing  is  like  Crashaw's  wishes:  kisses. 
To  him  gunpowder:  quicksilver  was  an  allowable  rhyme.  His 
abounding  fondness  for  the  whimsical  appeared  even  in  his 
commemorative  ode  "To  the  Immortal  Memory  and  Friendship 
of  that  Noble  Pair,  Sir  Lucius  Gary  and  Sir  H.  Morison,"  the 
first  "regular  Pindaric"  ode  in  English,  duly  equipped  by  the 
author  with  "turn,"  "counter-turn,"  and  "stand,"  each  three 


ELIZABETHANS  AND  RHYME  CONTROVERSY     121 

times  repeated.  In  this  he  split  his  own  name  between  what 
earlier  or  later  would  have  been  called  the  III  2  (antistrophe) 
and  III  3  (epode)  divisions : 

f'He  leaped  the  present  age, 

Possess'd  with  holy  rage, 
To  see  that  bright  eternal  day; 
Of  which  we  priests  and  poets  say 
Such  truths  as  we  expect  for  happy  men: 
And  there  he  lives  with  memory,  and  Ben 

"Jonson,  who  sung  this  of  him,  ere  he  went, 

Himself,  to  rest, 
Or  taste  a  part  of  that  full  joy  he  meant 

To  have  express'd 
In  this  bright  asterism. 
Where  it  were  friendship's  schism, 
Were  not  his  Lucius  long  with  us 'to  tarry, 
To  separate  these  twi- 
Lights,  the  Dioscuri; 
And  keep  the  one  half  from  his  Harry. 
But  fate  doth  so  alternate  the  design, 
Whilst  that  in  heaven,  this  light  on  earth  must  shine." 

We  should  remember  that  in  the  age  of  "conceits"  it  was  con- 
sidered proper  to  introduce  almost  any  kind  of  fancy  into  carved 
epitaphs  themselves,  and  of  course  into  mortuary  poetry. 

Jonson,  the  blank-verse  tragedian  of  Sejanus,  was  also  the 
light  comedian  of  The  Knight  of  the  Burning  Pestle;  and  in 
one  of  his  jovial  moods  of  not  unkindly  satire  he  enlivened  the 
literary  criticism  of  his  day  by 

."A  FIT  OF  RHYME  AGAINST  RHYME 

f  Rhyme,  the  rack  of  finest  wits, 
That  expresseth  but  by  fits 

True  conceit, 

Spoiling  senses  of  their  treasure, 
Cozening  judgment  with  a  measure, 

But  false  weight ; 

Wresting  words  from  their  true  calling, 
Propping  verse  for  fear  of  falling 

To  the  ground ; 

Jointing  syllables,  drawing  letters, 
Fastening  vowels,  as  with  fetters 

They  were  bound ! 
Soon  as  lazy  thou  wert  known, 
All  good  poetry  hence  was  flown, 

And  art  banished ; 


122  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

For  a  thousand  years  together 
All  Parnassus  green  did  wither 

And  wit  vanished. 
Pegasus  did  fly  away; 
At  the  wells  no  muse  did  stay 

But  bewailed. 
So  I  see  the  fountain  dry 
And  Apollo's  music  die, 

All  light  failed. 

Starveling  rhymes  did  fill  the  stage  — 
Not  a  poet  in  an  age, 

Worthy  crowning; 
Not  a  work  deserving  bays, 
Nor  a  line  deserving  praise, 

Pallas  frowning. 

Greek  was  free  from  rhyme's  infection; 
Happy  Greek,  by  this  protection, 

Was  not  spoiled, 

Whilst  the  Latin,  queen  of  tongues, 
Is  not  yet  free  from  rhyme's  wrongs, 

But  rests  foiled. 

Scarce  the  hill  again  does  flourish, 
Scarce  the  world  a  wit  doth  nourish, 

To  restore 

Phoebus  to  his  crown  again, 
And  the  muses  to  their  brain 

As  before. 

Vulgar  languages  that  want 
Words  and  sweetness,  and  be  scant 

Of  true  measure, 
Tyrant  rhyme  hath  so  abused 
That  they  long  since  have  refused 

Other  pleasure. 
He  that  first  invented  thee, 
May  his  joints  tormented  be, 

Cramped  forever; 
Still  may  syllables  jar  with  time 
Still  may  reason  war  with  rhyme, 

Resting  never  I 

May  his  sense,  when  it  would  meet 
The  cold  tumor  in  his  feet, 

Grow  unsounder; 
And  his  title  be  long  Fool, 
That  in  rearing  such  a  school 

Was  the  founder." 

At  the  close  of  the  sixteenth  century  the  impact  of  the  Revival 
of  Learning  upon  England  was  so  strong  that  a  number  of  poets 
and  critics  made  a  determined  effort  to  follow  those  Italians  — 
Alberti,  Trissino,  and  others  —  who  had  endeavored  to  cast  out 


ELIZABETHANS  AND  RHYME  CONTROVERSY     123 

rhyme  from  vernacular  poetry  and  substitute  classical  measures. 
As  Greek  and  Latin  verse  depend  upon  quantity  and  English 
verse  upon  stress  or  accent  (usually  coinciding  with  quantity) 
these  attempts  were  foredoomed  to  failure.  If  the  rules  of 
classical  quantity  alone  were  applied  to  English  verse,  accent 
parted  company,  and  the  lines  would  not  scan.  If,  on  the  other 
hand,  English  accent  were  substituted  for  classical  quantity  the 
result  was  so  unclassical  that  there  seemed  no  reason  why  rhyme 
should  not  be  added.  In  fact,  from  Sir  Philip  Sidney's  "  Asclepia- 
dics"  to  Swinburne's  "  Choriambics  "  and  Tennyson's  "  Hendeca- 
syllabics"  the  only  classical  measure  that  has  become  more  than  a 
scholarly  amusement  in  any  Teutonic  language  has  been  the 
hexameter.  Goethe  in  German,  and  Clough,  Kingsley,  and 
Longfellow  in  English  have  won  at  least  a  succes  d'estime  in  this 
form  of  verse;  but  their  hexameters  have  been  accentual 
throughout. 

As  the  hexameter  was  the  measure  of  Homer  and  Virgil,  the 
Elizabethan  classicists  made  it  their  rallying  point.  Some  were 
willing  that  it  should  be  rhymed ;  most  wished  to  discard  rhyme 
as  a  vulgar  and  intrusive  invention.  In  English  and  mediaeval 
Latin  rhyme  they  found  little  save  a  multitude  of  cheap  jingles ; 
for  to  them  Chaucer  was  antiquated  and  partly  unintelligible; 
Shakespeare  had  not  come  to  his  own;  and  Spenser,  whose 
earlier  work  they  admired,  at  one  time  joined  the  anti-rhyme 
crusade.  But  the  masters  of  Greece  and  Rome  loomed  large,  in 
the  glory  of  the  Renaissance;  therefore  their  methods,  down  to 
the  minutest  detail,  should  be  the  final  models  for  English  poetry. 
Dante,  for  some  reason,  was  strangely  ignored  in  the  argument. 

The  battle  began  with  the  publication  of  Roger  Ascham's 
The  Scholemaster  (1570).  Ascham  was  sympathetic  with 
Puritanism,  but  looked  with  favor  upon  Italian  humanistic 
canons.  Somewhat  inconsistent  in  his  criticisms  of  the  Morte 
Darthur  and  the  poems  of  chivalry,  for  immorality,  while  he  com- 
mended Virgil,  Ascham  felt  that  poetry  should  be  artistic,  not 
merely  natural.  He  was  a  pioneer  in  believing  classical  metres 
transferable  into  English;  yet,  he  said,  English  must  not  be  a 
mere  imitator.  Ascham's  position  was  really  due  to  his  inability 
to  appreciate  romance  or  romantic  sources  —  an  inability  which 


124  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

has  survived,  in  some  places,  to  our  own  day,  and  sometimes  has 
ruled  the  whole  literary  field.  His  grand  thesis,  which  was  copied 
as  indefinitely  as  ignorantly  by  many  of  his  successors,  was  that 
"our  rude  beggarly  rhyming"  was  "brought  first  into  Italy  by 
Goths  and  Huns,  when  all  good  verses  and  all  good  learning  too 
were  destroyed  by  them,  and  after  carried  into  France  and 
Germany,  and  at  last  received  into  England  by  men  of  excellent 
wit  indeed,  but  of  small  learning  and  less  judgment  in  that  be- 
half." In  wiser  times,  he  said,  men  should  follow  wiser  —  that 
is,  classical  —  examples.  It  is  foolish  "to  eat  acorns  with  swine, 
when  we  may  freely  eat  wheat  bread  amongst  men."  Chaucer, 
Surrey,  Wyatt,  and  others  were  commendable  for  translating 
some  Latin  authors,  but  if  they  had  been  "directed  to  follow 
the  best  examples,  and  not  have  been  carried  by  time  and  custom 
to  content  themselves  with  that  barbarous  and  rude  rhyming, 
amongst  their  other  praises,  which  they  have  justly  deserved, 
this  had  not  been  the  least,  to  be  counted  amongst  men  of  learn- 
ing and  skill  more  like  unto  the  Grecians  than  unto  the  Gothians 
in  handling  of  their  verse."  Quintilian,  said  Ascham,  did  not 
like  rhyme,  and  Quintilian's  company  was  good  enough  for  him. 

But  Ascham  was  not  to  blame  for  the  miserable  verse  produced 
by  the  English  manufacturers  of  "classical"  metres.  He  per- 
ceived that  the  monosyllabic  character  of  English  lent  itself  ill 
to  the  dactyl,  which  was  indispensable  in  Greek  and  Latin  scan- 
sion. Yet,  although  "carmen  exametrum  doth  rather  trot  and 
hobble  than  run  smoothly  in  our  English  tongue,"  he  saw  no 
reason  why  English  could  not  "receive  carmen  iambicum  as 
naturally  as  either  Greek  or  Latin."  It  would  take  some  work 
and  care,  but  work  was  the  very  thing  that  had  been  neglected  by 
the  authors  of  the  "lewd  and  rude  rhymes"  which  filled  the  shops. 

Ascham's  dislike  of  rhyme,  he  went  on  to  assure  his  readers, 
did  not  begin  "of  any  newf angle 1  singularity,"  but  had  long  been 
shared  by  many  wise  men.  The  defence  of  rhyme  had  been  due, 
in  part,  to  the  rhymers'  ignorance,  and  in  part  to  their  jealousy 
of  the  superior  powers  of  those  who  could  write  in  unrhymed 
classical  measures. 

Ascham  praised  Surrey  for  dropping  rhyme  in  his  translation 
1  "New-fangelnesse"  is  in  Chaucer. 


ELIZABETHANS  AND   RHYME  CONTROVERSY    125 

of  the  fourth  book  of  the  Mneid,  but  frankly  said  that  Surrey's 
"feet"  were  "feet  without  joints,"  "that  is  to  say,  not  distinct  by 
true  quantity  of  syllables;  and  so  such  feet  be  but  numb  feet." 
Admitting  this,  he  returns  to  his  charge,  and  urges  his  readers  to 
avoid  ignorance  and  idleness,  the  parents  of  English  rhyme,  and 
study  Virgil  and  Horace  as  Virgil  and  Horace  studied  Homer 
and  Euripides.  Then,  without  giving  any  proof  of  the  priority, 
aside  from  the  name  of  Surrey,  he  rejoices  "that  even  poor 
England  prevented  Italy  first  in  spying  out,  then  in  seeking  to 
amend,  this  fault  in  learning." 

In  1575  appeared  George  Gascoigne's  Ceriayne  Notes  of 
Instruction  concerning  the  Making  of  Verse  or  Ryme  in  English, 
written  at  the  request  of  Master  Edouardo  Donati.  It  is  interesting 
if  only  for  its  usually  correct  diagrams  of  scansion. 

Gascoigne  aristocratically  discriminated  between  "English 
rhymes"  and  "English  verses,"  and  deplored  the  fact  that  the 
rhymers  so  prevalently  used  the  "foot  of  two  syllables,  whereof 
the  first  is  depressed  or  made  short,  and  the  second  is  elevate  or 
made  long."  Excessive  alliteration  he  denounced,  and  said: 
"Ne  quid  nimis" ;  though  this  "figure,"  "being  modestly  used, 
lendeth  good  grace  to  a  verse."  Keep  the  words  in  their  proper 
pronunciation  and  order,  unless  "rhyme  enforceth";  but  even 
then  yield  sparingly.  "Do  not  let  rhyme  run  away  with  reason,  so 
that  the  sense  is  twisted  by  a  second  word  which  mars  your  idea, 
or  you  go  back  and  spoil  the  first  word  for  the  sake  of  the  second ; 
.  .  .  but  do  you  always  hold  your  first  determined  invention, 
and  do  rather  search  the  bottom  of  your  brains  for  apt  words 
than  change  good  reason  for  rumbling  rhyme." 

With  the  naivete  which  makes  his  treatise  delightful  in  the 
acrid  controversy  of  the  time,  he  gives  us  a  little  rhyming  dic- 
tionary, as  follows : 

"To  help  you  a  little  with  rhyme  (which  is  also  a  plain  young 
scholar's  lesson),  work  thus :  when  you  have  set  down  your  first 
verse  take  the  last. word  thereof  and  count  over  all  the  words  of 
the  self-same  sound  by  order  of  the  alphabet:  as,  for  example, 
the  last  word  of  your  first  line  is  care,  to  rhyme  therewith  you 
have  bare,  dare,  dare,  fare,  gare,  hare,  and  share,  nare,  snare,  rare, 
stare,  and  ware,  etc.  Of  all  these  take  that  which  best  may 


126  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

serve  your  purpose,  carrying  reason  with  rhyme ;  and  if  none  of 
them  will  serve  so,  then  alter  the  last  word  of  your  former  verse, 
but  yet  do  not  willingly  alter  the  meaning  of  your  invention." 

Finally,  "I  had  forgotten  a  notable  kind  of  rhyme,  called  riding 
rhyme,  and  that  is  such  as  our  Master  and  Father  Chaucer  used 
in  his  Canterbury  tales,  and  in  divers  other  delectable  and  light 
enterprises;  but,  though  it  come  to  my  remembrance  somewhat 
out  of  order,  it  shall  not  yet  come  altogether  out  of  time,  for  I 
will  now  tell  you  a  conceit  which  I  had  before  forgotten  to  write : 
you  may  see  (by  the  way)  that  I  hold  a  preposterous  order  in  my 
traditions ;  but,  as  I  said  before,  I  write  moved  by  good  will,  and 
not  to  show  my  skill.  Then  to  return  to  my  matter,  as  this  riding 
rhyme  serveth  most  aptly  to  write  a  merry  tale,  so  rhyme  royal  is 
fittest  for  a  grave  discourse.  Ballads  are  best  of  matters  of  love, 
and  rondlettes  most  apt  for  the  beating  or  handling  of  an  adage 
or  common  proverb ;  sonnets  serve  as  well  in  matters  of  love  as  of 
discourse;  dizaynes  and  sixaines  for  short  fantasies;  verlayes 
for  an  effectual  proposition,  although  by  the  name  you  might 
otherwise  judge  of  verlayes;  and  the  long  verse  of  twelve  and 
fourteen  syllables,  although  it  be  nowadays  used  in  all  themes, 
yet  in  my  judgment  it  would  serve  best  for  psalms  and  hymns." 

The  correspondence  (1579-1580)  between  Edmund  Spenser 
and  Gabriel  Harvey  on  "Reformed  Versifying"  and  related 
topics  is  of  interest  because  of  the  eminence  of  the  former  and 
the  activity  of  the  latter.  Harvey,  as  a  prose  writer,  was  sometimes 
turgid  and  inelegant,  and  always  without  charm.  No  poet  him- 
self —  his  verse  is  for  the  most  part  atrocious  —  he  was  a  poor 
advocate  of  poetic  reforms.  He  may  be  described  as  a  sort  of 
Cotton  Mather  in  the  field  of  aesthetics.  In  his  letters  he  em- 
phasized, as  had  Ascham,  the  superiority  of  the  long-prized 
masterpieces  of  classical  antiquity  over  the  crude  jingling 
ballads  and  romances  of  the  new  European  literatures. 

Harvey  was  a  "hexametrist,"  but  failed  to  understand  blank 
verse,  probably  because  it  was  not  classical  in  form.  Though  a 
classicist  and  anti-rhymer,  Harvey  was  an  advocate  of  stress  as 
over  mere  quantity.  To  him  accent  was  the  important  thing, 
and  syllables  were  made  long  or  short  only  by  "the  common 
allowed  and  received  prosody,  taken  up  by  a  universal  consent 


ELIZABETHANS  AND   RHYME   CONTROVERSY    127 

of  all,  and  continued  by  a  general  use  and  custom  of  all."  Yet 
he  thought  that  English  verse  could  be  improved  by  the  further 
application  of  classical  methods  to  its  rhythm.  Incidentally,  he 
hoped  to  diminish  the  divergences  between  rhythmical  stress, 
accent,  and  quantity  by  securing  "one  and  the  same  orthog- 
raphy" for  English.  Harvey's  denunciations  of  the  attempts 
made  by  some  of  his  fellow-classicists  of  the  extremer  order  to 
justify  "majestic,  royaltie,  honestie,  sciences,  faculties,  excellent, 
tavernour,  manfully,  faithfully,  .  .  .  bargdineth,  following,  har- 
rowing, thoroughly,"  etc.,  show  that  rhyme  and  accent  cannot 
always  be  taken  as  a  proof  of  contemporary  pronunciation. 
"Say  you  suddalnly,  if  you  like;  by  my  certainly  and  certainty 
I  will  not.  You  may  perceive  by  the  premises  (which  very  word 
I  would  have  you  note,  by  the  way,  too)  that  the  Latin  is  no  rule 
for  us."  "The  majesty  of  our  speech"  he  accounted  "the  only 
infallible  and  sovereign  rule  of  all  rules."  "In  short,  this  is  the 
very  short  and  the  long :  position  neither  maketh  short  nor  long  in 
our  tongue,  but  so  far  as  we  can  get  her  good  leave." 

With  so  much  of  common  sense  in  his  idea  of  English  versifica- 
tion, it  would  seem  strange  that  Harvey  produced  so  much  bad 
non-rhyming  verse  and  so  severely  criticised  the  rhymes  of  better 
poets  than  himself,  did  we  not  remember  that  he  prided  himself 
on  being  "the  inventor  of  the  English  hexameter,  whom  learned 
M.  Stanihurst  imitated  in  his  Virgil,  and  excellent  Sir  Philip 
Sidney  disdained  not  to  follow  in  his  Arcadia  and  elsewhere." 
The  beauty  of  his  hexameters  may  be  illustrated  by  a  very  few 
lines  —  the  fewer  the  better : 

f  Virtue  sendeth  a  man  to  Renown;  Fame  lendeth  Abundance; 
Fame  with  Abundance  maketh  a  man  thrice  blessed  and  happy; 
So  the  reward  of  famous  Virtue  makes  many  wealthy, 
And  the  regard  of  wealthy  Virtue  makes  many  blessed : 
O  blessed  Virtue,  blessed  Fame,  blessed  Abundance, 
O  that  I  had  you  three  with  the  loss  of  thirty  commencements." 

It  will  be  noticed  that  "blessed"  is  accented  in  two  ways  — 
twice  by  quantity  and  once  by  pronunciation  —  in  the  same  line. 

These  are  a  fair  specimen,  not  the  worst.  The  reader  will  be 
surprised  to  learn  that 

."For  squibbing  and  declaiming  against  many  fruitless  " 
is  a  hexameter,  in  the  opinion  of  its  proud  author. 


128  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

In  various  letters  and  prefaces,  in  later  years,  Harvey  continued 
to  air  his  views  and  his  personal  grievances ;  but  added  little  to 
his  previous  argument.  The  hexameter  was  "the  sovereign  of 
verses  and  the  high  controller  of  rhymes";  it  was  good  enough 
for  Homer  and  Virgil,  and  of  it  neither  Alexander  in  conquest 
nor  Augustus  in  majesty  was  ashamed,  "but  accounted  it  the 
only  gallant  trumpet  of  brave  and  heroical  acts."  "And  I  wis 
the  English  is  nothing  too  good  to  imitate  the  Greek  or  Latin." 

In  view  of  the  fact  that  he  was  the  greatest  English  poet  be- 
tween Chaucer  and  Shakespeare,  Spenser's  letters  show  an 
amazing  difference  between  critical  theory  and  mellifluous 
practice.  They  are  fortunately  few  and  short,  being  rather  wordy 
and  whimsical;  and  they  seem  to  indicate  that  the  writer  was 
dabbling  in  a  kind  of  criticism  in  which  he  felt  no  very  deep 
interest.  There  can  be  no  doubt,  however,  that  Spenser,  who 
was  recognized  by  his  contemporaries  as  a  great  poet,  and  was 
himself  pretty  thoroughly  Italianated,  notwithstanding  his  origi- 
nality, lent  the  influence  of  his  name  to  the  anti-rhyme  crusade. 
He  went  farther  than  Harvey  in  claiming  that  "carpenter"  could 
be  sounded  "carpenter"  in  verse,  as  bound  by  classical  laws 
of  quantity.  This  was  stoutly  denied  by  Harvey.  Spenser's 
original  work  in  unrhymed  classical  metres  is  barely  scannable, 
even  according  to  Latin  laws,  and  not  at  all  according  to  his  own 
English  practice  in  his  real  (rhymed)  poems.  It  must  be  ad- 
mitted, however,  that  some  of  the  lines  are  rather  pleasing  prose, 
or  even  poetry,  in  their  balance  of  contrasted  ideas.  Spenser's 
theory,  at  this  time,  was  that  we  should  "measure  our  accents  by 
the  sound,  reserving  the  quantity  to  the  verse."  The  difficulty 
with  this  neat  maxim  may  be  briefly  stated :  Quantity  is  either 
sounded  or  it  is  not.  If  sounded,  it  destroys  the  ordinary  pronun- 
ciation; if  not  sounded,  nobody  will  stop  to  think  of  it  at  all. 
Whatever  Greek  or  Latin  quantity  was,  it  must  have  had  some 
pleasurable  and  regulating  effect  on  the  ear ;  but  the  quantity  in 
Spenser's  line : 

"  Say  th&t  ragfng  love  d6th  app£l  the  we"ak  stomdch  " 

certainly  regulates  nothing. 
In  1579  "E.  K."  (name  not  known)  addressed  a  letter  to  Gabriel 


ELIZABETHANS  AND   RHYME  CONTROVERSY    129 

Harvey  in  praise  of  the  Shepheprdes  Calender  of  Spenser :  "  To 
the  most  excellent  and  learned,  both  orator  and  poet,  Master 
Gabriel  Harvey,  his  very  special  and  singular  good  friend  E.  K. 
commendeth  the  good  liking  of  this  his  labor  and  the  patronage 
of  the  new  poet."  As  regards  rhyme,  "E.  K.'s"  chief  grievance 
is  that  it  leads  to  the  misuse  of  the  English  language  by  the  un- 
warrantable introduction  of  "pieces  and  rags  of  other  languages, 
borrowing  here  of  the  French,  there  of  the  Italian,  every  where 
of  the  Latin,"  making  "our  English  tongue  a  gallimaufry  or 
hodgepodge  of  all  other  speeches."  But  "what  in  most  English 
writers  useth  to  be  loose,  and  as  it  were  ungirt,  in  this  author  is 
well  grounded,  finely  framed,  and  strongly  trussed  up  together. 
In  regard  whereof,  I  scorn  and  spue  out  the  rakehelly  rout  of 
our  ragged  rhymers  (for  so  themselves  used  to  hunt  the  letter), 
which  without  learning  boast,  without  judgment  jangle,  without 
reason  rage  and  foam,  as  if  some  instinct  of  poetical  spirit 
had  newly  ravished  them  above  the  meanness  of  common 
capacity." 

In  1582  Richard  Stanyhurst  published  in  Leyden  a  translation 
of  the  first  four  books  of  the  Mneid,  in  fearsome  hexameters  of 
the  Harvey  style.  In  his  preface  he  made  the  now  usual  attack 
on  the  "wooden  rhymers"  who  swarmed  in  the  stationers'  shops ; 
never  instructed  in  any  grammar  school,  and  satisfied  with  the 
commendation  of  the  ignorant.  But  Stanyhurst,  though  he 
undertook  to  scan  by  quantity,  agreed  with  Harvey  in  saying 
that  "the  ear,  not  orthography,  must  decide  the  quantity  as  near 
as  is  possible."  "Why  should  we,  with  the  strings  of  the  Latin 
rules,  cramp  our  tongue  more  than  the  Latins  do  fetter  their 
speech,  as  it  were,  with  the  chains  of  the  Greek  precepts?" 

Sir  Philip  Sidney's  Apologie  for  Poetrie,  written  about  1583  and 
printed  1595,  is  the  only  one  of  the  critical  treatises  of  the  period 
which  has  become  a  classic.  It  was  immediately  accepted  as 
important,  and  influenced  all  succeeding  Elizabethan  students  of 
poetry.  This  sweet-tempered  critic  and  creator  of  verse  stood 
serenely  between  the  two  schools  in  the  rhyme  controversy,  mainly 
ignoring  it.  The  lack  of  esteem  of  poetry  in  England  was,  he 
thought,  the  fault  of  "poet-apes,  not  poets" ;  and  he  conjured  his 
readers  "no  more  to  laugh  at  the  name  of  poets  as  though  they 

9 


130  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

were  next  inheritors  to  fools,  no  more  to  jest  at  the  reverent  title 
of  a  rhymer." 

Sidney's  "quantitative"  verse,  though  inferior  to  his  original 
work,  is  much  better  than  that  of  the  classical  reformers  already 
noticed. 

"  Ane  schort  Treatise  conteining  some  reulis  and  cautelis  to  be 
observit  and  eschewit  in  Scottis  Poesie"  (1584),  by  the  illustrious 
and  all-wise  King  James  the  Sixth  of  Scotland  and  King  James 
the  First  of  England  —  the  President  Roosevelt  or  Kaiser  Wil- 
helm  of  his  day  —  is  interesting  in  several  ways.  He  was  the 
latest  to  advise  alliteration:  "Let  all  your  verse  be  Literall,  sa 
far  as  may  be,  quhatsumever  kynde  they  be  of,  bot  speciallie 
Tumbling  verse  for  flyting.  Be  literall  I  meane  that  the  maist 
part  of  your  lyne  sail  rynne  upon  a  letter,  as  this  tumbling  lyne 
rynnis  upon  F : 

"  '  Fetching  fude  for  to  feid  it  fast  furth  of  the  Fane.'  " 

King  James's  rule,  "that  ye  rhyme  not  twice  in  one  syllable; 
as,  for  example,  that  ye  make  not  prove  and  reprove  rhyme  to- 
gether," may  be  regarded  as  the  chronological  end  of  a  once  per- 
missible custom.  Question  and  digestion  he  gives  as  examples  of 
words  accented  on  the  antepenult.  He  advises  against  lines  com- 
posed entirely  of  monosyllables,  "because  the  most  part  of  them 
are  indifferent,  and  may  be  in  short  or  long  place  as  ye  like. 
Some  words  of  divers  syllables  are  likeways  indifferent,  as 

"'Thairfore,  restore. 
I  thairfore,  then.' 

In  the  first  thairfore,  thair  is  short  and  fore  is  long ;  in  the  other, 
thair  is  long  and  fore  is  short;  and  yet  both  flow  alike  well." 
This  bit  of  common  sense  is  interesting,  coming  as  it  does  in  the 
middle  of  the  period  of  the  attempted  revival  of  quantity  in 
English. 

"A  Discourse  of  English  poetrie.  Together  with  the  authors 
judgment,  touching  the  re-formation  of  our  English  Verse.  By 
William  Webbe,  Graduate"  (1586),  was  a  violent  but  consistent 
attack  on  the  "rude  multitude  of  rustical  rhymers  who  will  be 
called  poets,"  and  an  attempt  to  teach  them  the  "right  practice 


ELIZABETHANS  AND   RHYME    CONTROVERSY    131 

and  orderly  course  of  true  poetry."  Webbe  —  who  would  deserve 
scant  attention  had  not  his  treatise  been  given  serious  considera- 
tion by  student  after  student  —  found  the  country  "pestered,  all 
shops  stuffed,  and  every  study  furnished"  with  "innumerable 
sorts  of  English  books,  and  infinite  fardels  of  printed  pamphlets." 
He  knew  "no  memorable  work  written  by  any  poet  in  our  English 
speech  until  twenty  years  past."  By  this  he  must  definitely  have 
meant  to  belittle  Chaucer,  for  he  proceeded  to  discuss  (apparently 
without  first-hand  knowledge)  Gower,  Chaucer,  and  Lydgate, 
whom  he  regarded  as  poets  of  about  equally  low  rank.  He 
denounced  the  "brutish  poetry"  "whereby  the  natural  property 
of  the  sweet  Latin  verse"  had  been  converted  into  "a  bald  kind 
of  rhyming,"  the  infection  whereof  would,  he  thought,  never  be 
rooted  up  in  England:  "I  mean  this  tinkerly  verse  which  we 
call  rhyme."  Then  followed  Ascham's  Goth-Hun  theory  of  the 
origin  of  rhyme.  The  author  of  Piers  Plowman  was  the  first 
known  to  Webbe  to  have  "observed  the  quantity  of  our  verse 
without  the  curiosity  of  rhyme." 

Webbe,  on  the  whole,  was  a  rather  ignorant  imitator;  and 
the  rest  of  his  treatise  largely  consisted  of  paraphrases  of  what 
had  already  been  said  by  Ascham  and  others,  eked  out  by  original 
diatribes  against  "the  uncountable  rabble  of  rhyming  ballad- 
makers  and  compilers  of  senseless  sonnets."  But  though  rhyme 
was  a  poor  thing  in  itself,  of  barbarous  origin  and  vulgar  use, 
it  had  become  so  ingrafted  in  English,  and  had  borne  such 
good  fruit  at  the  hands  of  the  best  poets,  that  Webbe  would 
retain  it,  as  of  necessity,  and  dignify  it  by  better  practice.  Rhyme 
or  rhythm  ought  to  be  a  just  proportion  in  any  kind  of  composi- 
tion ;  and  especially  in  verse  should  it  be  guarded  by  all  possible 
limitations,  "bettered,  and  made  more  artificial,  according  to 
the  worthiness  of  our  speech."  Rhyme,  with  all  its  faults,  "in 
our  English  tongue  beareth  as  good  grace,  or  rather  better, 
than  in  any  other."  There  should  be,  however,  a  "far  more 
learned  manner  of  versifying,"  which  Webbe  proceeded  to  ex- 
plain. Verses  should  be  answerable  to  each  other,  or  to  the  ac- 
companying tune;  words  should  not  be  wrested  from  their 
"natural  inclination  or  affectation,"  "or  more  truly  the  true 
quantity  thereof";  and  they  should  be  made  to  "fall  together 


132  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

mutually  in  rhyme,  that  is,  in  words  of  like  sound,  but  so  as  the 
words  be  not  disordered  for  the  rhyme's  sake,  nor  the  sense 
hindered.  These  be  the  most  principal  observations  which  I 
think  requisite  in  an  English  verse";  and  certainly  nobody  can 
object  to  them.  But  Webbe  was  not  aware  that  he  was  exactly 
describing  the  practice  and  the  triumph  of  Chaucer  himself. 

Apparently  Webbe  started  with  the  intention  of  attacking 
rhyme  as  such,  but,  made  timorous  by  the  fame  and  excellence 
of  Spenser's  Shepheardes  Calendar,  then  esteemed  the  ne  plus 
ultra  of  poetic  attainment,  he  changed  his  course  and  declared 
himself  merely  a  judicious  reformer,  on  classical  lines.  He 
then  proceeded  to  give  schemes  of  feet  and  verses  of  various 
lengths,  rhyme-arrangements,  etc.,  in  the  course  of  which  he 
sensibly  and  clearly  indicated  the  naturalness  of  the  iambic 
movement  in  English,  and  the  impossibility  of  transposing  it 
for  the  sake  of  quantity,  real  or  alleged.  Wrest  no  word,  unless 
its  accent  be  indifferent,  from  "his  natural  propriety."  Further- 
more, do  not  obscure  or  twist  the  fit  grammatical  order  for  the 
sake  of  rhyme.  Then,  having  in  one  catholic  paragraph  attacked 
rhyme  as  the  cause  of  "the  greatest  decay  of  that  good  order  of 
versifying  which  might  ere  this  have  been  established  in  our 
speech,"  and  also  apologized  for  it  as  deserving  "praise,  especially 
where  it  is  with  good  judgment  ordered,"  Webbe  gave  the  ele- 
ments of  a  rhyming-dictionary,  even  advising  the  memorizing 
of  words  for  the  sake  of  fluency  in  extempore  rhyming,  and  took 
time  to  explain  certain  "rare  devices  and  pretty  inventions" 
wherewith  rhymers  might  amuse  their  readers  and  hearers; 
but  yet  —  for  it  was  time  for  his  pendulum  to  swing  back  again 
—  he  was  "fully  and  certainly  persuaded  that  if  the  true  kind 
of  versifying  in  imitation  of  Greeks  and  Latins  had  been  practised 
in  the  English  tongue,  and  put  in  use  from  time  to  time  by  our 
poets,  who  might  have  continually  been  mending  and  polishing 
the  same,  every  one  according  to  their  several  gifts,  it  would 
long  ere  this  have  aspired  to  as  full  perfection  as  in  any  other 
tongue  whatsoever." 

Some  of  Webbe's  quantities,  as  given  in  his  illustrative  ex- 
amples of  feet  and  verses,  are  interesting.  Omitting  those  which 
are  common  in  present  use,  we  find  goodness  called  a  spondee 


ELIZABETHANS  AND]  RHYME   CONTROVERSY    133 

( — ) ;  hitJier  a  pyrrhic  (w  w) ;  dying  an  iambus  (v/  -) ;  forgive- 
ness a  molossus  ( ) ;  -merrily  a  tribrach  (v/  w  v) ;  travel- 
lers an  anapaest  (^  w  -) ;  remembers  a  bacchius  (w  — ) ; 
accorded  a  palimbachius  ( —  w) ;  dangerous  a  cretic  ( -  w  -) ; 
rejoiced  an  amphibrach  (w  -  w).  The  -&/  of  gladly  (adverb)  is 
short,  and  the  -lie  of  goodlie  (adjective)  long.  Surrey's  hexam- 
eters seemed  to  Webbe  to  be  "without  regard  of  true  quantity 
of  syllables."  He  included  in  his  treatise  hexameters  and  sap- 
phi  cs  of  his  own;  but  his  idea  of  hexameters  showing  "the  very 
perfection"  of  "all  the  rules  and  observations  of  the  best  versify- 
ing" is  shown  by  his  citing,  from  "one  Master  Watson,  fellow 
of  St.  John's  College  in  Cambridge,  about  40  years  past,"  the 
following  melodious  and  easily-scanned  lines : 

"All  tr3,v611ers  do  gladlfe  rgport  great  praise  t8  Ulysses, 
For  that  h6  knew  manle  men's  manners,  and  saw  many  citties." 

It  was  by  such  means  that  Webbe  trusted  to  "have  English 
poetry  at  a  higher  price  in  a  short  space:  and  the  rabble  of 
bald  rhymes  shall  be  turned  to  famous  works,  comparable  (I 
suppose)  with  the  best  works  of  poetry  in  other  tongues." 

In  1589,  with  his  preface  to  Robert  Greene's  "Menaphon: 
Camilla's  Alarum  to  slumbering  Euphues  in  his  melancholy 
cell  at  Silexdra,"  — the  preface  being  addressed  "to  the  Gentle- 
men Students  of  both  universities"  —  appeared  Thomas  Nash, 
the  most  violent  of  all  the  controversialists,  on  either  side  of  the 
rhyme  discussion.  Nash  vigorously  opposed  Harvey  and 
his  school.  Like  Campion,  who  was  to  follow,  he  utterly  dis- 
believed in  the  possibility  of  the  hexameter  in  English,  as  taking 
the  place  it  occupied  in  ancient  literatures;  but  he  did  not 
share  Campion's  urbanity.  He  was  so  angry  that  he  could  not 
stop  to  be  grammatical,  when  he  thought  of  the  "idiot  art 
masters"  who  "think  to  outbrave  better  pens  "  with  the  "swell- 
ing bumbast  of  a  bragging  blank  verse.  Indeed,  it  may  be  the 
ingrafted  overflow  of  some  kilcow  conceit,  that  overcloyeth 
their  imagination  with  a  more  than  drunken  resolution,  being 
not  extemporal  in  the  invention  of  any  other  means  to  vent 
their  manhood,  commits  the  digestion  of  their  choleric  incum- 
brances  to  the  spacious  volubility  of  a  drumming  decasillabon." 


134  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

Stanyhurst,  he  says,  in  his  hexameter  Virgil  "revived  by  his 
ragged  quill  such  carterly  variety  as  no  hodge  ploughman  in  a 
country  but  would  have  held  as  the  extremity  of  clownery;" 
in  proof  of  which  Nash  quoted  these  two  lines  from  a  descrip- 
tion of  a  tempest: 

"Then  did  he  make  heaven's  vault  to  rebound,  with  rounce  hobble 

hobble 
Of  ruff  raff  roaring,  with  thwick  thwack  thurlery  bouncing." 

Nash  returned  to  the  subject  of  poetry  in  The  Anatomy  of 
Absurdity,  issued  the  same  year.  Here  rhyme  was  not  his  special 
theme,  but  he  agreed  with  the  anti-rhymers  in  denouncing 
"those  exiled  Abbie-lubbers"  from  whose  idle  pens  proceeded 
"those  worn-out  impressions  of  the  feigned  nowhere  acts  of 
Arthur  of  the  Round  Table,  Arthur  of  Little  Britain,  Sir  Tris- 
tram, Huon  of  Bordeaux,  the  Squire  of  Low  Degree,  the  Four 
,  Sons  of  Amon,  with  infinite  many  others."  Nor  could  he  be 
patient  with  the  old  romancers  who  made  "scambling  shift" 
to  end  their  verses  alike ;  and  he  cited  some  of  the  rougher  lines 
in  Sir  Bevis  of  Hampton. 

Nash  was  merely  a  literary  soldier  of  fortune,  to  whom  it 
made  little  difference  whether  he  were  attacking  Puritanism  or 
hexameters,  rhyme  or  no-rhyme. 

Full  in  its  view  and  refreshingly  temperate  in  its  manner  was 
the  famous  Art  of  English  Poesy  which  George  Puttenham 
published  in  1589.  In  thoroughness  and  real  helpfulness  there 
had  been  nothing  so  good  in  previous  English  criticism.  Its 
modesty,  and  its  technical  rather  than  general  purpose,  gave 
it  a  practical  value  for  those  who  did  not  care  for  the  crotchets 
of  Harvey  and  the  Harveyans,  or  for  the  eloquent  generalities 
of  Sidney.  Puttenham  once  more  declared  accent  to  be  the  final 
arbiter,  but  readily  admitted  the  serviceability  of  the  study  of 
Latin  masters.  On  the  other  hand,  he  allowed  romantic  poems 
in  unclassical  forms.  If  English  had  not,  and  never  could  have, 
Greek  and  Latin  feet,  it  had  "instead  thereof  twenty  other 
curious  points  in  that  skill  more  than  they  ever  had,  by  reason 
of  our  rhyme  and  tunable  concords  or  symphony,  which  they 
never  observed." 


ELIZABETHANS  AND  RHYME  CONTROVERSY    135 

Indeed,  he  anticipated  many  of  the  scholarly  conclusions  con- 
cerning rhyme  which  were  to  be  newly  set  forth  in  our  own  day. 
Over  against  Greek  and  Latin  quantity,  he  tells  us,  and  earlier 
than  that  art,  was  a  "metrical  poesy"  and  a  "manner  of  rhyme" 
used  by  the  Hebrews  and  Chaldees.  So  "our  vulgar  running 
poesy"  was  "the  first  and  most  ancient  poesy,  and  the  most 
universal."  "The  American,  the  Perusine,  and  the  very  Can- 
nibal do  sing  and  also  say  their  highest  and  holiest  matters  in 
certain  rhyming  versicles,  and  not  in  prose,  which  proves  also 
that  our  manner  of  vulgar  poesy  is  more  ancient  than  the  arti- 
ficial of  the  Greeks  and  Latins,  ours  coming  by  instinct  of 
nature,  which  was  before  art  or  observation,  and  used  with 
the  savage  and  uncivil,  who  were  before  all  science  or  civility. 
The  natural  poesy,  therefore,  being  aided  and  amended  by  art, 
and  not  utterly  altered  or  obscured,  but  some  sign  left  of  it 
(as  the  Greeks  and  Latins  have  left  none),  is  no  less  to  be 
allowed  and  commended  than  theirs."  This  statement  could 
not  be  bettered  to-day;  its  idea  lies  at  the  foundation  of  the 
present  review  of  the  history  of  rhyme  in  England  and 
elsewhere. 

Puttenham  then  proceeds  to  take  up  in  order,  and  in  a  singu- 
larly agreeable  style,  the  decline  of  classical  verse;  the  rise  of 
end-rhyme  in  Greek  and  Latin,  under  Northern  influences, 
until  it  "altered  and  almost  split  their  manner  of  poesy";  and 
the  popularity  of  all  sorts  of  rhyming  Latin  jingles  —  political, 
medical,  proverbial,  satirical,  etc.  —  in  Charlemagne's  time 
and  after.  Even  Ovid  had  rhymed  by  chance,  and  Puttenham 
quotes  the  well-known  "Quot  coelum  stellas,"  as  he  had  already 
given  examples  of  mediaeval  rhymes.  Then  comes  one  of  the 
"defences"  of  poetry  so  common  at  that  day,  with  an  appeal 
to  keep  verse  from  "vain  conceits,  or  vicious,  or  infamous," 
and  to  limit  it  to  wise  or  properly  witty  ideas,  —  "the  praise 
of  virtue  and  reproof  of  vice."  Ancient  forms  of  poetry  are 
reviewed  at  length,  but  without  much  originality;  next  the 
author  turns  to  the  "vulgar  makings"  or  imitations  of  the  verse 
of  former  times:  "interlude,  song,  ballad,  carol,  and  ditty"  — 
terms  borrowed  from  the  French,  but  the  word  "song"  is  "our 
natural  Saxon  English  word."  The  chief  native  poets,  as  known 


136  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

to  the  writer,  are  characterized  by  name,  Chaucer  being  "the 
most  renowned  of  them  all." 

The  two  following  books  of  the  treatise  consist  of  a  detailed 
poetical  rhetoric,  under  the  divisions  of  "proportion  poetical," 
or  form,  and  "ornament."  All  the  arts  appeal  to  various  senses 
by  different  but  related  means,  "verses  or  rhyme  by  a  kind  of 
musical  utterance,  by  reason  of  a  certain  congruity  in  sounds 
pleasing  to  the  ear."  The  monosyllabic  character  of  English 
prevents  the  adoption  of  classical  feet.  Ancient  quantity  was 
"a  certain  numerosity  in  utterance."  "Take  this  away  from 
them  —  I  mean  the  running  of  their  feet  —  there  is  nothing  of 
curiosity  among  them  more  than  with  us,  nor  yet  so  much." 

As  for  English  measures,  the  caesura  at  the  end  of  the  eighth 
syllable  in  a  line  of  fourteen  "is  tedious,  for  the  length  of  the 
verse  keepeth  the  ear  too  long  from  his  delight,  which  is  to  hear 
the  cadence  or  the  tunable  accent  in  the  end  of  the  verse."  But 
the  caesura  ought  to  be  kept  precisely,  in  any  long  verse,  if  but 
as  a  law  to  "correct  the  licentiousness  of  rhymers,"  who,  if 
allowed  to  go  without  rule,  produce  nothing  better  than  "rhyme 
doggerel."  Though  English  has  a  "numerosity"  or  a  "certain 
flowing  utterance  by  slipper  words  and  syllables,"  something 
like  Greek  or  Latin  quantity,  it  must  chiefly  rely  upon  "tunable 
consents  in  the  latter  end  of  our  verses,"  for  which  the  monosyl- 
labic nature  of  English  is  excellently  fitted.  Puttenham  preferred 
the  rhyme-accent  on  the  ultimate,  and  endured  the  penultimate, 
but  thought  the  antepenultimate  suitable  only  for  light,  trivial, 
or  comical  vise.  Rhymers  who  wrench  accent  or  orthography 
(as  in  rhyming  restore :  door :  poor;  ram :  came ;  bean :  den)  have 
not  mastered  their  art.  Rhymes  both  in  the  middle  and  at  the 
end  of  verses  are  cloying,  trivial,  and  objectionable,  save  in  bal- 
lads or  tavern-poetry;  "in  our  courtly  maker  we  banish  them 
utterly."  Skelton,  who  was  fond  of  them,  was  but  a  "rude  rail- 
ing rhymer,"  pleasing  only  the  popular  ear. 

"Situation"  is  Puttenham's  term  for  length  and  arrangement 
of  words,  lines,  and  rhymes,  which  he  declares  to  be  of  large 
influence  in  the  poetical  result.  His  diagrams  of  couplets, 
stanzas,  etc.,  are  numerous  and  clever.  He  wastes  one  chapter 
by  giving  all  sorts  of  devices  of  rhymes  in  the  form  of  eggs, 


ELIZABETHANS  AND  RHYME  CONTROVERSY     137 

lozenges,  triangles,  columns,  pyramids,  anagrams,  posies,  etc.; 
but  we  must  remember  that  he  could  hardly  perceive  that  he 
was  thereby  playing  into  the  hands  of  the  anti-rhymers  by  mak- 
ing the  subject  ridiculous.  After  all,  it  was  near  the  beginning 
of  the  century  in  which  even  the  sensible  Sir  Thomas  Browne 
was  deeply  interested  in  quincunxes. 

Some  of  his  illustrations  of  feet  give  countenance  to  the 
quantitative  attempts  of  the  Harveyans,  as  patience  (dactyl); 
persisting  (molossus);  manifold  (anapaest);  lamenting  (bac- 
chius);  forsaken  (antibacchius) ;  excellent  (amphimacer).  But 
Puttenham  admitted  that  "by  usurpation"  some  words  were 
in  his  time  accented  even  back  of  the  antepenult,  of  which  he 
instances  honorable,  mdtrimony,  pdtrimony,  and  miserable, 
which  "neither  make  a  sweet  cadence,  nor  easily  find  any  word 
of  like  quantity  to  match  them." 

Sir  John  Harington's  preface  to  his  own  translation  of  the 
Orlando  Furioso  (1591)  "in  English  heroical  verse,"  defended 
the  use  of  two-syllabled  and  three-syllabled  rhymes,  to  which 
some  critics  had  taken  exception.  To  him  civility  rhymed  as 
properly  with  facility,  gentility,  and  eight  other  cited  words  as 
with  see,  or  decree,  which  he  calls  the  "ancient  manner  of  rhyme." 
He  justifies  himself  by  the  French  feminine  rhyme,  and  by  Sir 
Philip  Sidney,  who,  he  says,  not  only  uses  but  affects  such 
rhymes  as  signify : dignify ;  hide  away: bide  away. 

In  Francis  Meres'  "Palladis  Tamia;  Wit's  Treasury" 
(1598),  a  rambling  note-book  in  catalogue  style,  merely  com- 
pendious of  other  men's  opinions,  Piers  Plowman  is  mentioned 
as  "the  first  that  observed  the  true  quantity  of  our  verse  with- 
out the  curiosity  of  rhyme  " ;  and  Surrey  is  commended  for  avoid- 
ing "the  fault  of  rhyming"  in  his  translation  of  the  fourth  book 
of  the  Mneid. 

An  interesting  remark  is  that  of  George  Chapman,  in  the 
preface  (1598)  to  an  installment  of  his  rhymed  hexameter  trans- 
lation of  Homer:  "Let  the  length  of  the  verse  never  discourage 
your  endeavors;  for  talk  our  quidditical  Italianists  of  what 
proportion  soever  their  strutting  lips  affect,  unless  it  be  in  these 
couplets  into  which  I  have  hastily  translated  this  Shield,  they 
shall  never  do  Homer  so  much  right  in  any  octaves,  canzones, 


138  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

canzonets,  or  with  whatsoever  fustian  epigraphs  they  shall  entitle 
their  measures." 

Professor  Gregory  Smith,  in  the  introduction  to  his  Eliza- 
bethan Critical  Essays,  makes  two  effective  quotations  suggest- 
ing the  downfall  of  the  anti-rhyme  movement.  One  is  from 
the  Hymnus  in  Cynthiam  of  Chapman's  The  Shadow  of  Night  : 

"Sweet  poesy 

Will  not  be  clad  in  her  supremacy 
With  those  strange  garments  (Rome's  hexameters), 
As  she  is  English ;  but  in  right  prefers 
Our  native  robes  (put  on  with  skilful  hands  — 
English  heroics)  to  those  antic  garlands."  l 

The  other  is  from  Bacon's  De  Augmentis: 

"Illud  reprehendendum,  quod  quidam  antiquitatis  nimium  studiosi 
linguas  modernas  ad  mensuras  antiquas  (heroicas,  elegiacas,  sap- 
phicas,  etc.)  traducere  conati  sunt;  quas  ipsarum  linguarum  fabrica 
respuit,  nee  minus  aures  exhorrent.  In  hujusmodi  rebus  sensus  judi- 
cium  artis  praeceptis  praeponendum.  .  .  .  Neque  vero  ars  est,  sed 
artis  abusus,  cum  ilia  naturam  non  perficiat  sed  pervertat." 

Thomas  Campion's  Observations  in  the  Art  of  English  Poesie 
(1602)  is  chiefly  interesting,  like  Spenser's  letters,  because  of  the 
wide  divergence  between  the  poet's  theory  as  an  anti-rhymer 
and  his  success  as  a  rhymer.  Campion  was  no  Spenser,  but  he 
was  a  true  lyrist;  and  the  rediscovery,  or  reglorification,  of 
his  lyrical  poems  has  been  one  of  the  characteristic  features  of 
the  past  thirty  years  in  literary  criticism.  In  his  dedication 
Campion  says  that  "the  vulgar  and  unartificial  [inartistic] 
custom  of  rhyming  hath,  I  know,  deterred  many  excellent  wits 
from  the  exercise  of  English  poesy." 

In  this  treatise  Campion  leaves  no  doubt  of  his  position. 
"That  vulgar  and  easy  kind  of  poesy  .  .  .  which  we  abusively 
call  rhyme  and  meter"  began  in  "lack-learning  times,  and  in 
barbarized  Italy."  Alliteration  he  leaves  to  its  "own  ruin,"  and 
proceeds  to  set  forth  the  faults  of  the  rhymers.  They  do  not 
know  the  difference  between  an  iambus  and  a  trochee;  they 
put  a  pyrrhic  in  place  of  an  iambus ;  and  they  turn  their  backs 

1  Curiously,  this  last  line,  with  its  "antfc  garlands,"  is  almost  as  far 
from  modern  pronunciation  as  are  some  of  the  twists  of  the  anti-rhymers. 


ELIZABETHANS  AND  RHYME  CONTROVERSY     139 

on  the  glorious  triumphs  of  classical  verse.  The  "childish  titil- 
lation  of  rhyming"  is  a  poor  thing  to  set  against  "the  divinity  of 
the  Romans  and  Grecians,"  which  was  all  in  verse.  Would  not 
the  rhyming  Italians,  Frenchmen,  and  Spaniards,  if  it  were 
possible,  gladly  see  their  work  "translated  into  the  ancient 
numbers"  ?  He  bids  such  "numbers" 

"Tell  them  that  pity  or  perversely  scorn 
Poor  English  poesy  as  the  slave  to  rhyme, 
You  are  those  lofty  numbers  that  revive 
Triumphs  of  princes  and  stem  tragedies." 

But  he  admits  that  "the  Heroical  verse  [hexameter]  that  is  dis- 
tinguished by  the  dactyl  hath  been  oftentimes  attempted  in  our 
English  tongue,  but  with  passing  pitiful  success ;  and  no  wonder, 
seeing  it  is  an  attempt  altogether  against  the  nature  of  our 
language." 

In  little  chapters  on  iambics,  "the  iambic  dimeter,  or  the 
English  march,"  trochaics,  the  "English  Elegeick,"  sapphics, 
ditties  and  odes,  and  anacreontics,  Campion  sets  forth  his 
theories,  with  numerous  original  examples,  of  which  many  are 
clever  or  even  musical;  only  the  epigrams  being  atrocious. 
"Some  ears,"  says  he,  "accustomed  altogether  to  the  fatness 
of  rhyme,  may  perhaps  except  against  the  cadences  of  these 
numbers ;  but  let  any  man  judicially  examine  them,  and  he  shall 
find  they  close  of  themselves  so  perfectly  that  the  help  of  rhyme 
were  not  only  in  them  superfluous  but  also  absurd." 

Campion  said  definitely,  like  several  of  his  predecessors,  that 
accent  was  diligently  to  be  observed,  "for  chiefly  by  the  accent 
in  any  language  the  true  value  of  the  syllables  is  to  be  measured." 
But,  like  them,  he  disobeyed  this  sound  law,  and  in  his  lists 
of  quantities  stretched  the  natural  pronunciation  until  it  became 
unrecognizable.  The  wonder  is  that  he  so  often  escaped,  in  his 
original  unrhymed  verse,  the  corduroy-road  effects  of  most  of 
his  fellows.  Here  are  some  of  his  tabulated  quantities :  miseries, 
duties  (because  "the  last  syllable  of  all  words  in  the  plural 
number  that  have  two  or  more  vowels  before  s  are  [sic]  long") ; 
divining.  The  following  are  short  if  the  word  following  do 
begin  with  a  vowel:  "doth,  though,  thou,  now,  they,  too,  fly,  die, 
true,  due,  see,  are,  far,  you,  thee"  ;  but  "these  monosyllables  are 


140  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

always  short :  a,  the,  thy,  she,  we,  be,  he,  no,  to,  go,  so,  do."  This 
is  of  course  purely  arbitrary.  Campion  abruptly  closed  with  the 
very  just  remark  that  "  as  the  grammarians  leave  many  syllables 
to  the  authority  of  the  poets,  so  do  I  likewise  leave  many  to  their 
judgments ;  and  withal  thus  conclude,  that  there  is  no  art  begun 
and  perfected  at  one  enterprise." 

That  Campion  published  his  Books  of  Airs,  in  rhyme,  ten  or 
fifteen  years  after  this  disquisition,  may  fairly  be  taken  as  an 
abandonment  of  bis  theories.  The  whole  of  his  anti-rhyme 
argument  is  confuted  by  one  such  stanza  as 

f  Shall  I  come,  sweet  love,  to  thee, 
When  the  evening  beams  are  set? 

Shall  I  not  excluded  be? 
Will  you  find  no  feigned  lett? 

Let  me  not,  for  pity,  more, 

Tell  the  long  hours  at  your  door." 

When,  says  Carlyle,  Napoleon  planted  his  cannon  in  front  of 
the  church  of  St.  Roch,  he  "blew  the  French  Revolution  into 
space."  Something  similar  might  be  said  of  Samuel  Daniel's 
A  Defence  of  Rhyme,  which  appeared  about  1603,  were  it  not 
for  its  good  temper  and  quiet  style.  It  marked  the  end  —  with 
one  sporadic  exception  —  of  the  movement  against  rhyme 
which  succumbed  before  its  common  sense. 

This  Defence  was  in  the  form  of  a  letter  in  reply  to  Campion's 
Observations,  and  was  addressed  to  "a  learned  gentleman," 
that  is,  William  Herbert,  Earl  of  Pembroke;  and  afterwards, 
when  printed,  to  "all  the  worthy  lovers  and  learned  professors 
of  rhyme  within  his  majesty's  dominions."  The  author's  origi- 
nal purpose,  he  tells  us,  was  to  defend  his  "own  undertakings 
in  that  kind." 

Daniel's  command  of  the  subject  is  so  full,  and  his  "sweet 
reasonableness"  so  refreshingly  unlike  the  acrid  temper  of  some 
of  his  predecessors,  that  one  is  tempted  to  quote  half  his  tractate. 
But  as  it  is  now  accessible  in  Professor  Gregory  Smith's  volumes, 
a  brief  summary  will  suffice. 

He  had  thought  that  rhyme  was  to  be  accepted  "as  if  from  a 
grant  of  nature" ;  but  it  seemed  that  it  too,  in  a  time  when  many 
things  were  challenged,  was  to  be  decried  by  some  as  barbarous, 


ELIZABETHANS  AND   RHYME  CONTROVERSY     141 

and  defended  by  others  as  fit  and  right.  He  himself  must  either 
quit  the  use  of  rhyme,  or  defend  its  practice.  Every  rhymer  in 
the  kingdom  was  interested  in  the  case,  and  for  them,  as  well  as 
for  himself,  Daniel  would  speak.  All  languages  have  their 
own  metrical  characteristics  and  uses ;  and  English  has  as  good 
a  right  to  employ  what  befits  its  own  nature  as  has  any  other 
tongue,  ancient  or  modern.  Accent,  harmony,  and  numbers  in 
English  so  combine  as  to  give  as  musical  results  in  rhyme  as 
any  language  can  show.  Rhyme  is  so  widespread  a  thing  that 
it  seems  "an  hereditary  eloquence  proper  to  all  mankind." 
Then  follows  a  list  of  sixteen  other  peoples  using  it.  Even  Latin 
was  not  satisfied  until  it  had  adopted  so  good  a  vehicle  of  poetic 
expression. 

Rhyme  had  been  universally  influential  in  expressing  and 
arousing  the  deepest  feelings  of  humanity;  whereas  the  new 
metrical  experiments  had  not  delighted,  stirred,  or  satisfied,  nor 
did  Daniel  think  they  ever  would  "in  our  climate,  if  they  show 
no  more  work  of  wonder  than  yet  we  see. "  In  fact,  the  new  quan- 
titative verses  were  "laboured  measures,"  and  for  "the  general 
sort"  "but  as  an  orderly  prose  when  we  have  all  done."  Art 
ought  not  to  be  a  thing  to  confound  the  understanding.  Rhyme 
calls  for  the  highest  and  best  efforts,  and  is  wings,  not  an  impedi- 
ment. 

The  stanza,  with  its  rich  variety  and  effective  climax,  was 
never  attained  by  the  Greeks  and  Latins ;  but  all  our  understand- 
ings are  not  to  be  built  by  the  square  of  Greece  and  Italy.  We 
are  the  children  of  nature  as  well  as  they;  we  are  not  so  placed 
out  of  the  way  of  judgment  but  that  "the  same  sun  of  discretion 
shineth  upon  us."  The  attempts  of  the  quantitative  poets  in 
Italy  had  been  as  unsuccessful  as  those  in  England,  and  un- 
rhymed  verse  had  been  let  alone  by  such  true  poets  as  Petrarch 
and  Tasso.  The  classical  reformers'  eight  new  numbers  in  Eng- 
lish, when  examined,  proved  to  be  either  old  measures  under 
new  names,  or  else  dependent  on  strained  accents.  It  is  useless 
to  try  to  "turn  the  fair  stream  and  full  course  of  her  [English] 
accents  into  the  shallow  current  of  a  less  uncertainty,  clean  out 
of  the  way  of  her  known  delight." 

But  though  Daniel  undertook  to  "defend  the  sacred  monu- 


142  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

merits"  bf  the  national  genius,  as  expressed  in  time-honored 
forms,  he  frankly  admitted  that  there  were  some  things  in  rhyme 
which  he  did  not  like.  One  was  "these  continual  cadences  of 
couplets  used  in  long  and  continued  poems,"  which  he  found 
"very  tiresome  and  unpleasing,  by  reason  that  still,  methinks, 
they  run  on  with  a  sound  of  one  nature,  and  a  kind  of  certainty 
which  stuffs  the  delight  rather  than  entertains  it."  To  pass 
over  the  rhyme,  when  the  violence  of  the  matter  will  break 
through,  "is  rather  graceful  than  otherwise."  Tragedies,  too, 
best  comport  with  blank  verse  and  dispense  with  rhyme,  save 
in  choruses,  or  "where  a  sentence  shall  require  a  couplet." 
Daniel's  own  experiments  in  putting  rhymes  more  than  one  line 
apart  he  hardly  regarded  as  successful,  "alternate  or  cross 
rhymes  holding  still  the  best  place  in  my  affection."  Feminine 
rhymes  should  not  carelessly  or  at  random  be  mixed  with  others ; 
they  are  best  for  ditties. 

Yet  there  can  be  no  absolute  law  in  these  matters.  All  things 
change;  and  poets  are  proverbially  self-willed  and  self-satisfied. 
Even  good  satisfactory  English  words  are  displaced  by  poor 
foreign  substitutes.  "But  this  is  but  a  character  of  that  per- 
petual revolution  which  we  see  to  be  in  all  things  that  never 
remain  the  same :  and  we  must  herein  be  content  to  submit  our- 
selves to  the  law  of  the  time,  which  in  a  few  years  will  make 
all  that  for  which  we  now  contend  Nothing." 

This  was  the  end,  save  that  sixty  years  later  Milton  himself  — 
Milton,  the  "mighty-mouthed  inventor  of  harmonies"  —  in  the 
preface  to  his  masterpiece,  ranged  himself  with  the  opponents 
of  rhyme,  and  against  his  own  triumphant  practice  as  one  of 
the  greatest  masters  of  rhyme  who  ever  lived.  The  rhymed 
English  stanza  had  never  been  brought  to  higher  excellence 
than  in  the  ode  On  the  Morn  of  Christ's  Nativity;  no  sonnets 
had  spoken  in  mightier  music  than  that  of 

."Avenge,  O  Lord,  thy  slaughtered  saints,  whose  bones 
Lie  scattered  on  the  Alpine  summits  cold ; " 

while  L' Allegro  and  II  Penseroso  had  shown  the  capabilities  of 
the  four-stressed  rhymed  measure  to  turn  with  infallible  effec- 
tiveness from  iambic  to  trochaic  and  back  again,  according  to 


ELIZABETHANS  AND  RHYME   CONTROVERSY     143 

the  demands  of  the  thought,  and  had  forever  created  a  new 
genre  in  English :  that  of  the  idyllic  combination  of  description 
and  reflection.  His  other  triumphs  in  rhyme  need  no  new  chronicle 
here,  nor  his  work  in  the  two  foreign  languages  most  concerned 
in  the  rhyme-controversy,  namely,  the  Italian  and  the  Latin. 
It  is  enough  to  cite  the  definite  words  which  he  prefixed  to  our 
great  blank- verse  epic: 

"The  measure  is  English  heroic  verse  without  rhyme,  as  that 
of  Homer  in  Greek  and  of  Virgil  in  Latin,  —  rhyme  being  no 
necessary  adjunct  or  true  ornament  of  poem  or  good  verse,  in 
longer  works  especially,  but  the  invention  of  a  barbarous  age, 
to  set  off  wretched  matter  and  lame  metre ;  graced  indeed  since 
by  the  use  of  some  famous  modern  poets,  carried  away  by 
custom,  but  much  to  their  own  vexation,  hindrance,  and  con- 
straint to  express  many  things  otherwise,  and  for  the  most  part 
worse,  than  else  they  would  have  expressed  them.  Not  without 
cause  therefore  some  both  Italian  and  Spanish  poets  of  prime 
note  have  rejected  rhyme  both  in  longer  and  shorter  works,  as 
have  also  long  since  our  best  English  tragedies,  as  a  thing  of 
itself,  to  all  judicious  ears,  trivial  and  of  no  true  musical  delight ; 
which  consists  only  in  apt  numbers,  fit  quantity  of  syllables, 
and  the  sense  variously  drawn  out  from  one  verse  into  another, 
not  in  the  jingling  sound  of  like  endings,  —  a  fault  avoided  by 
the  learned  ancients  both  in  poetry  and  all  good  oratory.  This 
neglect  then  of  rhyme  so  little  is  to  be  taken  for  a  defect,  though 
it  may  seem  so  perhaps  to  vulgar  readers,  that  it  rather  is  to  be 
esteemed  an  example  set,  the  first  in  English,  of  ancient  liberty 
recovered  to  heroic  poem  from  the  troublesome  and  modern 
bondage  of  rhyming." 

But  we  must  remember  that  nobody  had  denied  the  majesty 
or  the  necessity  of  blank  verse  in  English,  which  was  neither  a 
novelty  nor  a  heresy;  and  it  is  significant  that  Milton  never  put 
himself  on  record  as  favoring  or  practising  the  "quantitative" 
writing  of  the  hexametrists.1  He  was  a  free  inheritor  and  user 

1  Landor,  in  one  of  his  Imaginary  Conversations,  makes  Milton  say 
to  Marvel:  "My  nephew  reads  Latin  to  me;  and  he  reminded  me  one 
day  that  Sir  Philip  Sidney  tried  his  hand  at  turning  our  English  into 
Latin  hexameters.  Some  of  the  Germans  have  done  likewise.  English 
and  German  hexameters  sound  as  a  heavy  cart  sounds  bouncing  over 


144  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

of  English  as  it  had  been  used  by  his  predecessors  who  were 
true  and  great  poets:  by  Chaucer,  Spenser,  Shakespeare.  The 
rhythm  in  Paradise  Lost  itself  is  not  more  important  than  in 
the  rhymed  Ode  on  the  Nativity ;  if  the  monosyllabic  blank- 
verse  ... 
"  Rocks,  caves,  lakes,  fens,  bogs,  dens,  and  shades  of  death  " 

needs  no  supporting  rhyme,  neither  does  the  sonnet-line 
"  They  also  serve  who  only  stand  and  wait." 

Whether  Milton  was  rhyming  or  writing  blank  verse,  he  was 
simply  making  the  best  use  of  means  toward  ends.  Thought- 
rhyme  and  end-rhyme  in  the  splendid 

f'Ring  out,  ye  crystal  spheres, 
Once  bless  our  human  ears, 

If  ye  have  power  to  touch  our  senses  so; 
v    And  let  your  silver  chime 
Move  hi  melodious  time ; 

And  let  the  base  of  heaven's  deep  organ  blow; 
And  with  your  ninefold  harmony 
Make  up  full  consort  to  the  angelic  symphony" 

were  une  in  his  creating  mind. 

Omitting  many  technical  points,  I  must  call  attention,  in  this 
Ode,  to  a  few  important  indications  of  contemporary  pronuncia- 
tion :  unsufferable :  council-table  ;  began :  ocean  ;  alone :  union  ; 
said :  made  ;  great :  set ;  sweat :  seat ;  fast :  haste. 

In  Lycidas,  which  is  rhymed  throughout,  the  effect  is  curiously 
rhymeless  until  the  closing  passage  —  doubtless  because  of  the 
variant  line-lengths  in  an  essentially  slow  movement,  and  the 
frequency  of  run-on  lines,  such  as 

"Comes  the  blind  fury  with  the  abhorred  shears 
And  slits  the  thin-spun  life." 

This  has  a  distinctly  Shakespearean  swing,  and  so  does 

"And  when  they  list,  their  lean  and  flashy  songs 
Grate  on  their  scrannel-pipes  of  wretched  straw." 

boulders."  —  Crump's  ed.,  VI,  39.  —  Elsewhere  Landor  said  of  the 
hexameter  (writing  in  the  measure  itself) :  "  Latin  and  Greek  are  alone 
its  languages.  We  have  a  measure  fashioned  by  Milton's  own  hand,  a 
fuller,  a  deeper,  a  louder." 


ELIZABETHANS  AND  RHYME  CONTROVERSY    145 

Milton,  in  the  chorus  of  Samson  Agonistes,  used  lines  of  differ- 
ent stresses  and  lengths  (sometimes  almost  unscannable  recita- 
tive), with  rhymes  at  random,  and  apparently  accidental  asso- 
nances. Such  freedom  is  roughly  suggestive  of  Greek  choral 
methods. 


10 


VIII 
FORMAL    RHYME 

One  two,  three  four,  five  six,  seven  eight,  nine  ten, 
One  two,  three  four,  five  six,  seven  eight,  and  then 
Add  here  an  adjective,  perhaps  a  thought, 
Start  with  a  trochee,  and  your  couplet 's  wrought. 

SOME  such  formula  as  this  was  the  rule  of  most  English  verse 
from  Dryden's  Religio  Laid,  at  the  close  of  the  seventeenth 
century,  to  the  Lyrical  Ballads  of  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge, 
at  the"  end  of  the  eighteenth. 

The  history  of  the  heroic  couplet  has  been  traced  many  times ; 
never  better  than  in  Gosse's  From  Shakespeare  to  Pope.  In 
one  sense  Waller  was  its  earliest  promoter;  in  another  sense 
Donne.  There  is  a  curious  priority  in  Donne's 

"How  sits  this  city,  late  most  populous, 
Thus  solitary,  and  like  a  widow  thus? 
Amplest  of  nations,  queen  of  provinces, 
She  was,  who  now  thus  tributary  is" 

(The  Lamentations  of  Jeremy.) 

—  it  is  a  sort  of  reminiscence  of  Wyatt  and  anticipation  of 
Dryden.  Donne  —  who  always,  it  is  evident,  pronounced  his 
verses  very  slowly  —  rhymes  humorist:  chest;  here:  philosopher; 
tye:body;  earnest :  best ;  gone :  dissolution ;  there:  tear.  Once 
he  has  the  assonance  other :  lover. 

But  in  a  truer  sense  nobody  can  be  picked  out  as  the  chrono- 
logical leader  of  the  procession.  The  iambic  pentameter  rhymed 
couplet  was  nothing  new  in  our  poetry.  It  was  Chaucer's  vehicle 
for  the  greater  part  of  the  Canterbury  Tales;  it  formed  an 
integral  element  in  Shakespeare's  earlier  plays;  it  closed  the 
Shakespearean  sonnet.  Yet  the  "heroic  couplet"  from  Waller 


FORMAL  RHYME  147 

to  Pope  was  a  different  thing  from  the  previous  rhymed  aa 
pentameters.  In  it  the  line  expressed  an  idea,  or  a  unified  part 
of  an  idea;  and  the  couplet  brought  the  thought,  or  the  clearly 
individualized  part  of  a  thought,  to  a  symmetrical  close..  Seldom 
did  the  meaning  of  a  line  run  on  into  its  successor,  and  still 
more  seldom  did  a  couplet  fail  to  carry  its  own  proper  burden. 
The  line  was  just  long  enough  for  a  neat  statement,  the  couplet 
just  adequate  to  give  that  statement  a  turn.  The  merit  of  the 
product  was  its  finish;  the  demerit  its  sacrifice  of  imagination 
to  thought. 

When  French  regularity  seemed  altogether  delightful  in  Eng- 
land; when,  in  the  non-original  critical  and  observant  eight- 
eenth century,  all  Britain  considered  reflection  superior  to  imagi- 
native creation;  this  old  form,  revised  in  the  manner  already 
noted,  proved  to  be  the  very  thing  needed. 

If  the  highest  function  of  poetry  were  to  philosophize  or  to 
describe,  nothing  better  than  such  a  vehicle  could  be  asked. 
Tens  of  thousands  of  pleased  and  instructed  readers  have  found 
Pope's  Essay  on  Man  the  ne  plus  ultra  of  prosodic  utterance. 
In  my  native  New  England  town  —  at  that  time  having  say  two 
thousand  inhabitants  —  two  separately  printed  editions  were 
issued  seventy  years  after  Pope's  death ;  and  its  popularity  else- 
where was  not  less.  That  popularity  continues  to-day.  Those 
who  read  little  or  nothing  know  many  parts  of  the  Essay  on  Man 
and  the  Essay  on  Criticism  from  their  mere  currency  in  familiar 
quotation.  They  are  coin  of  the  intellectual  realm.  Many  a 
modern  reader  finds  their  practical  philosophy,  expressed  with 
absolute  clearness,  better  worth  while  than  Wordsworth's 
"mooning"  about  nature,  or  Poe's  wandering  in  the  mystic  mid- 
region  of  Weir.  In  some  ways  Pope  is  the  most  successful  man 
who  ever  wrote  English  verse;  and  he  is  successful  because 
nobody  else  so  well  caught  the  very  pulse  of  the  machine. 

But  it  was,  after  all,  a  machine  and  nothing  more.  Upon  that 
fact  rests  its  triumph,  and  therein  lies  its  fatal  limitation.  The 
rhymed  couplet  of  the  eighteenth  century  was  preeminently  the 
vehicle  for  uninspired  didacticism  and  superficial  description. 
Here  "An  honest  man's  the  noblest  work  of  God" ;  here  "Hope 
springs  eternal  in  the  human  breast:  Man  never  is,  but  always 


148  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

to  be  blest;"  here  rivers  and  poems  are  "Strong  without  rage, 
without  o'erflowing,  full";  here,  on  every  topic, 

" The  relish  of  the  Muse  consists  in  rhyme; 
One  verse  must  megt  another  like  a  chime." 

In  the  English  eighteenth-century  couplet,  neither  the  first 
nor  the  second  line  regularly  gave  the  law  to  the  other.  The 
couplet  virtually  became  a  stanza,  and  the  string  of  couplets  a 
poem  of  few  stanzas  or  many,  as  the  case  required.  If  three 
pentameters  were  strung  together  and  duly  marked  by  a  bracket, 
or  if  the  alexandrine  added  a  decorous  variation,  it  was  still 
true  that  "English  poetry  seemed  bound  in  a  ten-linked  chain." 
But  we  need  have  no  quarrel  with  what  its  master,  Pope,  called 
(in  Dryden) 

"  The  varying  verse,  the  full  resounding  line, 
The  long  majestic  march,  the  energy  divine." 

For  the  full  resounding  line  we  may  be  duly  thankful,  though 
the  energy  divine,  in  the  jEschylean  or  the  Shakespearean  or  the 
Shelleyan  sense,  is  the  one  thing  lacking. 

Among  the  "dull  sweets  of  rhyme,"  which  Dryden  by  turns 
tasted  and  rejected,  he  gave  us  stand:  England;  clangor:  anger; 
Jehoshaphat :  fate  ;  come :  doom  ;  indignation :  passion  ;  scorn : 
return ;  choose :  depose ;  break:  weak;  halves :  knaves ;  fit:  sweet; 
forth:  mirth;  pretence :  prince ;  express :  cease ;  rock:  smoke;  and 
(consecutive)  state:  treat;  flash:  dish;  dress' d:  feast,  —  these  last 
a  pretty  good  illustration  of  the  freedom  in  which  he  believed. 
Once  he  has  again:  plain;  at  another  time  again:  then.  This 
word  has  long  had  both  rhyme-sounds,  according  to  the 
exigencies  of  the  sense. 

Dryden's  greatest  rhyme-achievement  —  dwarfing  the  once- 
read  dramas  and  the  didactic-propagandist  Religio  Laid  and 
The  Hind  and  the  Panther,  is  to  be  found  in  the  two  Saint 
Cecilia's  Day  odes,  which,  in  their  thought,  onomatopoeia,  femi- 
nine rhymes,  and  rapidly  changing  measures,  seem  to  overleap 
a  hundred  years  and  take  their  place  in  the  poetry  of  the  Ro- 
mantic revival.  Dryden's  odes  are  modern  in  their  very  essence : 
while  other  poets  were  slavishly  imitating  classical  models  — 


FORMAL  RHYME  149 

and  were  to  do  so  for  nearly  a  hundred  years  to  come  —  Dryden 
was  here  as  unfettered  as  Wordsworth  or  Keats. 

Indeed,  if  ever  a  man  was  born  too  late  and  too  early  it  was 
"glorious  John."  Parts  of  his  plays  are  unexcelled  by  the  work 
of  any  Elizabethan  dramatist  save  Shakespeare;  and  when 
reading  them  we  seem  to  be  "betwixt  and  between"  the 
very  charm  of  1600  and  all  the  freshness  of  1800.  Read, 
for  instance,  the  passage  in  (Edipus  giving  Tiresias'  incan- 
tation of  the  ghost  of  Laius ;  or  the  song  in  The  Spanish  Friar 
beginning : 

'.' Farewell,  ungrateful  traitor, 

Farewell,  my  perjured  swain, 
Let  never  injured  creature 

Believe  a  man  again. 
The  pleasure  of  possessing 
Surpasses  all  expressing, 
But  't  is  too  short  a  blessing 

And  love  too  long  a  pain." 

Dryden,  notwithstanding  his  rhyme-triumphs  in  two  schools 
of  composition,  the  didactic  and  the  lyric,  was  at  one  time,  in 
respect  to  one  form  of  poetry,  apparently  inclined  to  join  the 
company  of  the  decriers  of  rhyme.  In  1678  he  wrote  that  he 
had  "disencumbered"  himself  of  it,  finding  blank  verse  more 
suitable  to  tragedy,  —  an  unquestionable  truth.  Rhymed 
dramas  like  Dryden's  earlier  plays  were  a  passing  fashion  at  the 
beginning  of  the  last  quarter  of  the  seventeenth  century.  In 
brief,  Dryden  had  defended  rhyme  for  comedies  because  of  its 
fitness  for  effective  sallies  or  repartees ;  and  for  tragedies  because 
it  was  farther  removed  from  prose.  But  experience  soon  con- 
vinced him  and  the  other  best  critics  of  the  time  —  which,  at 
Dryden's  death  in  1700,  was  able  to  show  but  a  few  coarse 
comedians  as  the  sole  representatives  of  major  English  literature 

—  that  blank  verse  was  the  dignified  vehicle  for  English  dra- 
matic expression.     Rhyme,  indispensable  to  the  French  stage, 
has  never  long  been  welcome  to  the  English. 

At  the  time  (1663)  when  Milton's  work  was  at  its  height  and 
Dryden's  had  not  yet  reached  its  period  of  greatest  productivity, 

—  between  the  days  of  Shakespeare  and  those  of  Pope,  —  the 
rollicking  rhymes  of  Butler,  like  some  of  the  more  serious  verbal 


150  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

music  of  Dryden,  anticipated  modern  freedom.  Butler  was 
constrained  by  nothing  save  his  own  whims,  and  invented  rhymes 
as  he  chose,  or  twisted  them  out  because  of  the  necessities  of 
thought.  False :  tails  was  a  good  enough  rhyme  for  him,  and 
sun :  down  entirely  satisfactory.  Indeed,  he  evidently  felt  that 
part  of  the  fun  was  the  wrenching  of  sounds  from  their  accustomed 
laws.  His  rattling  octosyllables  —  "Hudibrastic"  verse  —  were 
so  well  suited  to  his  jocose  plan  that  many  years  elapsed  before 
this  measure  was  turned  once  more  to  serious  uses  of  narration 
or  description.  Butler's  frequent  use  of  feminine  rhymes  — 
inclined  to: mind  to;  disparage :  plum  porridge,  etc.,  did  for 
satirical  poetry  what  Milton's,  in  L' Allegro  and  II  Penseroso,  had 
done  for  idyllic. 

The  general  freedom  of  rhyme-use  between  Butler  and  Gray 
may  be  illustrated  by  a  few  examples,  chronologically  arranged. 
Prior  has  errs:  cares;  complaint:  elephant.  Addison,  east :  west; 
faint :  pant.  Watts,  led :  spread :  shade.  Young,  great :  complete. 
Gay,  ermine :  charming.  Pope,  toast:  lost;  devil:  civil;  re- 
mained: land;  descant :  per  cent ;  mayors:  wars;  waves :  receives ; 
sour:  poor;  hair:  sphere;  feast:  guest;  air:  star;  boast:  lost;  rise: 
precipice;  fry :  jealousy ;  said:  laid;  said:  head.  Seldom  does 
he  use  such  a  rhyme  as  side :  subside,  but  he  is  not  afraid  of  it. 
His  come :  room ;  Rome :  dome  ;  Rome :  doom  ;  Rome :  come  — 
like  Dryden's  come :  doom,  just  mentioned  —  are  reminders  not 
only  of  an  old  pronunciation  of  o  but  of  the  coupling  of  different 
vowel-sounds  in  necessary  words  having  few  rhymes,  a  practice 
in  vogue  all  the  way  from  Shakespeare  to  Lowell. 

Two  things  which  Pope  thought  undesirable  in  the  heroic 
couplet  were,  in  his  own  words:  "The  repeating  [sic]  the  same 
rhyme  within  four  or  six  lines  of  each  other,  which  tire  the  ear 
with  too  much  of  the  like  sound" ;  and  "the  too  frequent  use  of 
alexandrins,  which  are  never  graceful,  but  where  there  is  some 
majesty  added  to  the  verse  by  them,  or  when  there  cannot  be 
found  a  word  in  them  but  what  is  absolutely  needful."  His 
advice  is  better  than  his  English. 

Regarding  the  subject  matter,  even  Pope  clearly  saw  the  evils 
into  which  the  heroic  couplet  fell  so  easily  and  so  often;  and 
in  the  Essay  on  Criticism  he  denounced  those  versifiers  who 


FORMAL  RHYME  151 

"ring  round  the  same  unvaried  chimes, 
With  sure  returns  of  still-expected  rhymes; 
Where'er  you  find  '  the  cooling  western  breeze,' 
In  the  next  line  it  'whispers  through  the  trees.'" 

Aside  from  love,  Rome,  etc.,  some  other  essential  words  have 
few  rhymes,  and  therefore  similarly  sounding  words  must  be 
forced  to  go  in  their  company.  Such  a  word  is  blood,  which 
Dryden  rhymes  with  stood;  Butler  with  stood;  Pope  with  stood, 
good,  and  wood;  Gay  with  wood;  Byron  with  stood;  Scott  with 
stood;  Keble  with  rude;  and  Tennyson  with  good.  Wind  (noun) 
has  few  companions  in  sound,  hence  wind,  in  poetry  said  or  sung. 
Such  rhymes  as  those  just  cited  led  Mitford,  in  despair,  to  exclaim 
that  "the  harmony  of  English  poetry,  from  Shakespeare  to 
Cowper,"  was  in  "danger  of  becoming  shortly  as  problematical 
as  that  of  Chaucer." 

Mitford  incidentally  gives  us  some  interesting  information 
concerning  eighteenth-century  pronunciation.  To  his  ear  "the 
middle  sound  of  a,  in  can,  fallow,  father,  example,"  was  the  same. 
He  pronounced  e  in  merchant,  Derby,  Hertford,  Berkshire,  and 
Berkeley  as  a  in  jar.  Of  these  the  four  last  survive  in  England, 
but  none  of  the  words  is  likely  to  appear  in  rhyme.  Nearer  to 
our  subject  is  his  allusion  to  "the  diphthongal  characters  ea,  ei, 
ey,  as  in  bear,  heir,  grey"  To  journey  he  gave  the  same  sound  as 
in  rough,  young ;  a  pronunciation  now  dialectal  and  rare.  More 
interesting  is  his  charge  that  the  poets  of  the  eighteenth  century 
were  largely  responsible  for  making  join  and  point,  for  instance, 
rhyme  with  fine  and  pint.  That  the  former  was  the  deliberate 
use  of  the  best  poets  of  his  time  is  clear.  Pope  has  line :  join ; 
join:  divine;  joined:  mankind;  Shenstone,  entwind :  joined : 
unkind;  Gray,  shine:  join;  Cowley,  join. "vine;  Dry  den,  join: 
design;  declined :  joined ;  Butler,  join:  design;  Falconer,  join: 
line;  Addison,  find:  join' d;  Beattie,  join:  shine.  This  is  iden- 
tity, not  similarity,  of  sound,  and  proves  the  pronunciation, 
which,  indeed,  survived  in  poetry  until  Coleridge's  joined :  mind, 
Wordsworth's  joined:  kind,  and  Bulwer's  mind:  enjoined. 
Equally  clear  is  Gray's  toil :  smile,  fortified  by  Dryden's  defile : 
spoil;  Falconer's  soil:  smile;  and  Byron's  aisle:  recoil  and  aisles: 
toils.  Byron,  it  will  be  remembered,  was  an  admirer  of  Pope. 


152  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

Other  once  perfect  rhymes,  now  impermissible,  are  Donne's 
enter :  venture  (venter  is  Yankee  dialect  to-day) ;  Donne's  waste : 
wast;  Waller's  haste:  last;  Dryden's  plac'd:  last;  cast:plac'd; 
unbought :  draught ;  Pope's  past:  waste;  away:  sea;  Swift's 
survey :  tea;  Warton's  convey :  sea;  Dryden's  way :  sea;  Cowper's 
survey:  sea;  Moore's  sway:  sea;  Gay's  display:  sea;  nature: 
satire;  nature:  creature;  Gray's  satire:  nature  (nater  is,  of  course, 
in  full  dialectal  use  to-day).  A  similar  proof,  by  rhyme,  of  the 
existence  of  a  now  discarded  (or  but  local)  pronunciation  is 
Halleck's  saw:  hurrah,  in  Marco  Bozzaris  (1827). 

Great  was  long  one  of  the  uncertain  words.  Gay  has  seat: 
great;  great:  cheat;  conceit :  great.  Young  has  great:  compete. 
Pope's  state :  great,  with  Rowe's  seat :  great,  led  Johnson  to  say, 
in  the  plan  of  his  dictionary:  "Some  words  have  two  sounds 
which  may  be  equally  admitted  as  being  equally  defensible  by 
authority"  —  a  remark  which  has  not  lost  its  force. 

A  few  rhymes  which  may  here  be  noted,  almost  at  random, 
are  Thomson's  issued:  brew' d;  Shenstone's  yield :  field :  wield : 
filled;  Akenside's  urn :  mourn ;  year:  share;  Goldsmith's  arms: 
warns;  and  Warton's  come :  tomb ;  eve:  grave. 

The  poems  of  Gray  and  Collins  are  the  oases  in  the  classical 
verse  of  the  century.  Their  odes,  and  many  of  their  other  pieces, 
strongly  show  the  prevalent  influences  of  the  day;  but  much  of 
their  work  is  touched  by  the  romantic  spirit.  If  Gray  wrote 
Pindaric  odes,  he  was  also  interested  in  Welsh  and  Norse  themes 
and  methods;  and  Collins  was  the  author  of  How  Sleep  the 
Brave  as  well  as  the  Ode  to  Evening  —  which,  though  ultra- 
classical  and  unrhymed,  is  thoroughly  natural  in  sentiment. 

Gray,  rather  than  his  predecessors,  Davenant  and  Dryden,  in 
his  Elegy  popularized  the  alternately  rhyming  iambic  pentameter, 
thus  combining  dignified  stability  and  easy  variety  in  a  way 
which  was  influential  in  shortening  the  reign  of  the  couplet. 
Furthermore,  since  the  measure  is  manifestly  unsuitable  for 
narrative,  Gray  did  not  hesitate  to  use  run-on  lines  and  run-on 
stanzas ;  in  one  instance  a  narrative  stanza  of  the  Elegy  does  not 
end  even  with  a  comma. 

On  the  whole,  Gray  succeeded  better  when  bound  by  frequently 
recurring  rhymes  than  when,  as  in  the  Pindaric  odes,  he  used 


FORMAL  RHYME  153 

rhymes  farther  separated.  Cowley's  Pindaric  strophes,  so 
popular  until  Gray's  time,  were  denounced  by  Johnson  as  con- 
cealing deficiencies,  flattering  laziness,  and  starting  boys  and 
girls  to  "write  like  Pindar";  but  the  irregularly  rhymed  and 
divided  English  ode,  Pindaric  or  other,  is  much  harder  to  pro- 
duce than  the  heroic  couplet,  and  has  been  less  abused.  In 
general,  as  we  have  seen,  the  English  ear  does  not  carry  rhymes 
more  than  three  lines  apart;  and  even  then  they  must  appear 
at  stated  intervals.  The  rhymes  of  Wordsworth's  great  ode  are 
sometimes  forgotten  before  their  companions  are  reached. 

In  the  Elegy  are  128  lines,  of  which  114  have  rhymes  that  are 
still  perfect  (including  muse:  strews).  Toil:  smile  was,  as  we 
have  seen,  perfect  at  the  time.  Rove:  love;  borne:  thorn,  would 
attract  no  attention  in  a  modern  poem.  This  leaves  withstood: 
blood;  obscure :  poor ;  beech:  stretch,  and  abode:  God;  of  which 
none,  probably,  —  with  the  possible  exception  of  the  second  — 
was  a  perfect  rhyme  in  Gray's  day.  Gray's  ear  did  not  object  to 
the  assonances  relies :  requires :  cries :  fires,  in  consecutive  lines. 
In  his  sonnet  On  the  Death  of  Richard  West  he  has  also  in  con- 
secutive lines,  shine,  fire,  join,  attire,  repine,  require,  mine,  ex- 
pire. If  this  was  intentional,  it  shows  that  repeated  assonances 
have  become  less  pleasing  to  the  English  ear  since  Gray's  time. 
In  the  Elegy  "The  breezy  call  of  incense-breathing  morn"  is 
objectionable  to  some  modern  readers,  but  must  have  seemed 
musical  to  the  author.  The  day :  lea :  way :  me  of  the  first  stanza 
he  at  any  rate  allowed  to  stand ;  and  the  twentieth  century  takes 
pleasure  at  least  in  the  internal  alliterations  and  assonances 

"The  curfew  tolls  the  knell  of  parting  day, 

The  lowing  herd  winds  slowly  o'er  the  lea, 
The  ploughman  homeward  plods  his  weary  way, 
And  leaves  the  tcorld  to  darkness  and  to  me." 

Most  of  Gray's  rhymes  call  for  no  mention ;  among  the  excep- 
tions are  men :  complain :  vain ;  cheer :  bear :  hear ;  car:  bear. 

The  ultimate  purpose  of  rhyme  of  any  kind  —  and  of  end- 
rhyme  in  all  modern  languages  —  is  to  give  an  added  and 
pleasurable  emphasis  to  the  thought  of  the  poet.  Hence  the 
rhyme-words  should  be  the  significant  turning-places  of  the 
thought,  or  the  climax  to  which  it  leads.  An  unusual  illustration 


154  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

of  this  fact  is  found  in  a  statement  once  made  to  William  Winter 
by  Edmund  Clarence  Stedman,  that  it  was  his  custom  to  select 
with  care  the  particular  form  of  verse  that  he  designed  to  use, 
and  sometimes  to  invent  the  rhymes  and  write  them  at  the  ends 
of  the  lines  which  they  were  to  terminate,  thus  making  a  skeleton 
of  a  poem  as  a  ground-work  on  which  to  build.  Some  poets 
have  gone  so  far  —  among  them  the  French  de  Banville  *  —  as 
to  declare  that  there  can  be  but  one  right  word  for  the  rhyme- 
place,  and  that  its  use  is  not  so  much  a  matter  of  selection,  on 
the  singer's  part,  as  of  downright  inspiration.  Thus  the  American 
religious  poet  Jones  Very  felt  that  he  was  directly  led  by  the 
Spirit  of  God  to  compose  his  sonnets  in  their  existing  form. 
Poetic  practice  is,  of  course,  a  refutation  of  such  extreme  views 
for  many  a  writer  of  a  genius  far  exceeding  that  of  de  Banville  or 
Very  has  left  rhyme-revisions  on  record.  But  in  the  most 
felicitous  verse  —  and  in  direct  proportion  to  its  felicity  —  is  to 
be  found  a  lightness  of  word  which  goes  far  to  leave  on  the 
hearer's  mind  the  impression  that  nothing  else  would  have  suf- 
ficed. This  rightness  is  especially  necessary,  and  especially 
welcome,  in  terminational  rhymes.  Take,  for  instance,  Collins' 
Ode  Written  in  MDCCXLVI : 

"How  sleep  the  Brave,  who  sink  to  rest 
By  all  their  Country's  wishes  blest ! 
When  Spring,  with  dewy  fingers  cold, 
Returns  to  deck  their  hallow'd  mould, 
She  there  shall  dress  a  sweeter  sod 
Than  fancy's  feet  have  ever  trod. 

"By  fairy  hands  their  knell  is  rung, 
By  forms  unseen  their  dirge  is  sung: 
There  Honour  comes,  a  pilgrim  gray, 
To  bless  the  turf  that  wraps  their  clay: 
And  Freedom  shall  awhile  repair 
To  dwell  a  weeping  hermit  there ! " 

Perfection  rests  upon  the  whole;  and  it  was  not  an  accident 
that  led  Collins  to  use  no  rhyme  that  was  not  fit  in  thought  and 
perfect  in  correspondence  of  sound.  Here  was  no  place  for  ex- 
perimentation or  uncertainty. 

A  similar  verbal  felicity  may  be  found  in  parts  of  his  To 
1  See  page  19. 


FORMAL  RHYME  155 

Evening,  the  last  elaborate  attempt  at  an  unrhymed  classical  ode 

—  a  poem  with  many  variant  effects  of  alliteration,  assonance, 
and  tone-color,  but  without  end-rhyme,  though  carefully  written 
in  stanzas  of  two  iambic  pentameters  followed  by  two  iambic 
trimeters.    Here  we  have 

"Now  air  is  hush'd,  save  where  the  weak-eyed  bat 
With  short  shrill  shriek  flits  by  on  leathern  wing, 
Or  where  the  beetle  winds 
His  small  but  sullen  horn," 

—  very  suggestive  of  the  second  stanza  of  the  Elegy;   "some 
wild  and  heathy  scene";   "hamlets  brown,  and  dim-discovered 
spires,"  with  their  "simple  bell" ;  while  Evening's  "dewy  fingers 
draw  the  gradual  dusky  veil"  —  the  same  figure  as  that  in  the 
ode  just   quoted.     But  this   experiment   in   rhymeless   quasi- 
Horatian  stanzas  cannot  be  called  successful,  as  regards  its  form. 
When  listened  to,  the  hearer  does  not  distinguish  it  from  blank 
verse,  save  that  he  feels  that  he  is  somehow  losing  the  count  of 
feet  and  the  balance  of  lines.    The  accidental  rhyme  vale:  hail 
of  stanza  5  throws  him  off  the  track ;    and  scene :  gleams  in 
stanza  8  and  all :  drawl  in  stanza  10  are  no  help.    This  is  not 
hypercriticism ;    for  a  poem  that    does  not   make  its  scheme 
apparent  is  defective.     Over  and  over  again  have  the  poets 
proved  that  while  quantity  sufficed  in  Greek  and  Latin,  it  does 
not  in  English ;  therefore  other  devices  must  be  used  to  give  the 
effect  of  finish  and  completeness.    Yet,  when  all  is  said,  the  form 
of  Collins'  interesting  experiment  is  more  poetically  satisfying 
than  that  of  Marvell's  Ode  upon  Cromwell's  Return  from  Ireland, 
correctly  written  in    rhymed    iambic    tetrameters    (two  lines) 
followed  by  two  rhymed  iambic  trimeters.     The  lines  in  the 
latter  are  too  short  for  rhyme,  and  the  effect  is  so  jerky  that  the 
poem  owes  much  of  its  endurance  to  the  popular  passage 

"He  nothing  common  did  or  mean 
Upon  that  memorable  scene." 

The  stanza 

"Nature,  that  hateth  emptiness, 
Allows  of  penetration  less, 

And  therefore  must  make  room 
When  greater  spirits  come  " 

is  not  poetry  at  all ;  nor  is 


156  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

f'And  now  the  Irish  are  ashamed 
To  see  themselves  in  one  year  tamed." 

The  lesson  of  these  two  "Horatian"  odes,  taken  together,  one 
without  rhyme  and  the  other  with,  is  that  poetic  words  however 
arranged  are  better  than  prosy  words  arranged  in  perfect  rhyme ; 
and  that,  in  English,  rhyme  cannot  be  added  to  a  Horatian 
metre  in  such  a  manner  as  to  retain  either  Latin  or  English 
beauty. 

Johnson  and  Goldsmith  went  too  far  in  their  dislike  of  blank 
verse  as  being  pedantic,  or  verse  only  to  the  eye,  —  which  it 
certainly  is  not,  in  Milton  or  Tennyson ;  but  there  was  truth  in 
their  opinion  in  so  far  as  it  applied  to  shorter  lines. 

Goldsmith's  fault :  sought  is  a  good  example  of  many  words 
which  have  changed  their  pronunciation  within  a  comparatively 
short  time.  The  New  English  Dictionary  says  that  fault,  in 
Pope  and  Swift,  rhymes  with  thought,  wrought;  and  Johnson, 
1755,  says  that  in  conversation  the  /  is  generally  suppressed. 
In  many  dialects  the  pronunciation  is  still  (fpt).  When  French 
introduced  the  word  from  Latin  it  discarded  the  I,  and  so  did 
the  imitating  English;  but  both  languages  re-introduced  it  in 
the  fifteenth  century. 

The  heroic  couplet  came  down  the  years  to  Rogers,  who  died 
in  1855,  but  who,  notwithstanding  his  life  in  the  nineteenth 
century  and  his  "Mine  be  a  cot  beside  a  hill,"  belongs  to  the 
classical  rather  than  the  romantic  school.  For  the  purpose  of 
the  present  discussion  his  oftentimes  excellent  verse  needs  no 
examination.  Nor  does  that  of  Crabbe,  which  is  mainly  prose, 
whether  its  nominal  form  be  blank  verse,  couplets,  triplets,  or 
stanzas.  Perhaps,  of  all  poets  considered  eminent  by  anybody, 
Crabbe  is  the  most  conspicuous  example  of  the  dangerous 
tendency  of  the  heroic  couplet  to  lead  to  a  twisting  of  the  sense 
for  the  sake  of  the  rhyme.  Take,  at  random,  his  observations  on 
books,  in  which  every  other  line  is  so  ground  out  that  one  hears 
the  squeak  of  the  crank.  Books,  says  he, 

"soothe  the  grieved,  the  stubborn  they  chastise, 
Fools  they  admonish,  and  confirm  the  wise ; 
Their  aid  they  yield  to  all :  they  never  shun 
The  man  of  sorrow,  nor  the  wretch  undone; 


FORMAL  RHYME  157 

Unlike  the  hard,  the  selfish,  and  the  proud, 
They  fly  not  sullen  from  the  suppliant  crowd; 
Nor  tell  to  various  people  various  things, 
But  show  to  subjects  what  they  show  to  kings." 

Here  "chastise,"  "shun,"  "crowd,"  and  "things"  are  the  obedi- 
ent followers  of  "wise,"  "undone,"  "proud,"  and  "kings"; 
only  the  last  line  leaving  any  sense  of  that  moderate  talent 
which,  so  often  in  the  eighteenth  century,  used  to  assume  the 
garb  of  genius.1 

On  the  whole,  though  many  later  poets  —  even  including 
Holmes  and  Lowell  —  have  used  it,  the  great  period  of  the 
heroic  couplet  ended  with  Goldsmith.  No  lovelier  or  more 
triumphant  finale  could  be  given  than  that  afforded  in  The 
Deserted  Village,  from  its  first  line  to  its  last.  Nor  is  it,  as  some 
have  said,  a  composite  of  pensive  reflection  and  political  economy ; 
there  is  mere  poetry  in  such  lines  as 

"No  more  thy  glassy  brook  reflects  the  day, 
But,  choked  with  sedges,  works  its  weedy  way; 
Along  thy  glades,  a  solitary  guest, 
The  hollow-sounding  bittern  guards  its  nest ; 
Amidst  thy  desert  walks  the  lapwing  flies, 
And  tires  their  echoes  with  unvaried  cries. 
Sunk  are  thy  bowers  in  shapeless  ruin  all, 
And  the  long  grass  o'ertops  the  mouldering  wall." 

1  Crabbe  "was  always  ready  to  write  'meanly,'  in  a  kind  of  rhyming 
prose,  —  if  the  phrase  is  allowable,  —  in  which  not  the  prose  but  the 
rhyme  seems  to  be  the  intruder.  He  could  write  — 

'."  Mamma  look'd  on  with  thoughts  to  these  allied; 
She  felt  the  pleasure  of  reflected  pride'; 

or  even  thus  — 

i"  But  how  will  Bloomer  act 

When  he  becomes  acquainted  with  the  fact?' 

Much  of  the  meanness  of  such  passages  is  due  to  their  thick  and  lumber- 
ing rhymes.  Act,  fact;  all,  scrawl;  aunt,  grant;  flood,  mud!  The  whole 
weight  of  a  couplet  lies  upon  its  rhymes,  and  Crabbe  does  not  mind 
making  the  worst  of  them. "  —  OLIVER  ELTON,  in  Blackwood's  Magazine, 
January,  1909. 


IX 
ROMANTIC    RHYME 

THE  eighteenth  century  in  English  poetry  was  a  time  of  comment, 
the  nineteenth,  of  creation.  To  the  eighteenth  belonged  reflection, 
obvious  description,  rhetoric,  the  heroic  couplet,  and  formality  of 
rhyme;  to  the  nineteenth,  imagination,  world- wide  curiosity, 
originality,  stanzas  of  every  kind,  and  rhymes  of  the  utmost 
freedom.  At  the  beginning  of  the  romantic  movement  came 
Burns,  who  cared  not  for  form,  and  Blake,  who  knew  not  form. 
Furthermore,  at  the  time  of  the  appearance  of  the  Lyrical 
Ballads  of  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge,  in  1798  —  that  "discovery 
of  a  new  world  in  English  poetry"  —  the  influence  of  the  old 
border  ballads  was  powerful :  poems  in  which  the  expression  of 
passionate  feeling  was  everything,  and  stresses,  line-lengths, 
alliterations,  assonances,  and  end-rhymes  of  every  sort  merely 
means  toward  the  one  desired  end. 

Cowper,  to  whom  blank  verse  and  rhyme  were  almost  indiffer- 
ent, spoke  of  "the  clock-work  tintinnabulum"  of  the  latter; 
but  the  author  of  The  Loss  of  the  Royal  George  certainly  knew 
how  to  employ  it  with  a  directly  musical  effectiveness  which  might 
have  been  envied  by  any  of  the  romantic  poets.  The  old  ballad- 
ists  used  no  freer  rhyme  than  the  overset :  complete  of  the  poem 
just  named,  or  the  plain:  man;  man:  again;  and  thought:  lot 
of  The  Solitude  of  Alexander  Selkirk. 

In  Blake,  at  the  very  start  of  the  romantic  movement,  freedom 
was  almost  anarchy.  Mrs.  Browning  might  have  envied  his 
lamb:  name;  lambs:  hands;  tomb:  come;  song:  among;  valley: 
melancholy;  dawn:  scorn;  blessing :  ceasing ;  blossom:  bosom; 
dreadful :  heedful ;  nest:  beast.  Vault:  fraught;  and  poor:  door 
were  possibly  good  rhymes  in  his  day,  but  field  .'beheld  could 
hardly  have  been.  Once  he  used  read :  reed. 


ROMANTIC  RHYME  159 

Blake  harked  back  to  his  favorite  Ossian,  and  anticipated  not 
only  the  Coleridge  of  1798,  but  also  the  Walt  Whitman  of  1855. 
Between  semi-rhythmical  prose  and  the  pure  lyric  he  ranged  at 
will,  his  language  being  as  kaleidoscopic  as  his  thought.  While 
reading  him  we  think  now  of  the  King  James'  Bible,  now  of 
Swedenborg,  now  of  Emerson.  His  visions  were  as  far-reaching 
as  Dante's,  but  of  Dante's  almost  mathematical  self-control  he 
had  hardly  a  trace,  changing  suddenly  from  lucidity  to  utter 
obscurity. 

Like  the  old  balladists,  he  was  fond  of  seven-stressed  loose 
movements,  but,  unlike  them,  he  was  willing  to  omit  rhyme. 
His  America  is  a  characteristic  example  of  this  measure.  As 
regards  thought-rhyme,  no  better  illustration  can  be  found  in 
his  works  than  the  five  lines  of  the  inscription  to  his  Ghost  of 
Abel  (1822),  which  W.  M.  Rossetti  calls  "a  compendious 
example  of  the  union  of  quaintness,  profundity,  and  mysticism 
which  the  prophetical  books  exhibit." 

."To  Lord  Byron  in  the  Wilderness.  —  What  dost  thou  here,  Elijah? 
Can  a  poet  doubt  the  visions  of  Jehovah? 
Nature  has  no  outline,  but  Imagination  has; 
Nature  has  no  time,  but  Imagination  has; 
Nature  has  no  supernatural,  and  dissolves;  Imagination  is  eternity." 

In  Burns  the  influence  of  dialect  was  added  to  that  of  the 
ballads.  He  evidently  fretted  under  the  trammels  of  exact 
rhyme.  Thus  —  to  choose  almost  at  random  —  we  have  morn- 
ing :  wand' ring  ;  returning :  morning  ;  beauty :  duty :  true  to  ; 
feather :  beaver ;  farthing :  regarding ;  determine :  farming ;  mind: 
syne;  befriend  me:  sustain  me;  wander :  slumber ;  money:  upon 
me  ;  beastie :  breastie  ;  hasty :  chase  thee  ;  dominion :  union :  com- 
panion; nibble  .'trouble.  His  eye:  joy;  untried :  enjoy  it;  and 
soil:  toil:  vile:  while:  aisle,  are  the  correct  eighteenth-century 
pronunciation,  already  noted  in  Gray  and  others.  Creature: 
nature;  ardour :  farther ;  and  farther :  regard  her  remind  us 
of  the  antiquity  of  pronunciations  still  surviving. 

The  Spenserian  stanza  of  The  Cottar's  Saturday  Night  was 
of  course  common  property;  it  had  been  used  by  Shenstone, 
Thomson,  and  Akenside  before  Burns,  as  it  was  by  Byron, 
Keats,  Shelley,  and  Tennyson  after  him.  On  the  whole,  it 


160  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

proved  less  suitable  for  a  folk-idyl  than  Goldsmith's  heroics  or 
Whittier's  octosyllabics.  The  peculiar  "Burns  metre  "  of  To  a 
Lmise  on  a  Lady's  Bonnet,  To  a  Field  Mouse,  etc.,  is  first  found 
in  the  fifteenth  century;  it  is  a  wearisome  measure  to  all  but 
Burns  enthusiasts,  and  has  been  discarded  save  by  his  avowed 
imitators. 

Wordsworth,  though  more  methodical  than  most  of  his  con- 
temporaries, did  not  hesitate  to  use  such  rhymes  as  echo :  cuckoo ; 
come:  home;  weather :  hither ;  stroke :  clock :  shock ;  and  kettle: 
metal.  He  unquestionably  dropped  his  g  in  words  ending  in  -ing, 
as,  witness  daring :  pairing :  war  in  (Hint  from  the  Mountains), 
and  sullen :  pulling  (Ode  on  Immortality).  Yankees  are  supposed 
to  be  peculiar  in  the  omission  of  this  guttural-terminant ;  but 
its  lack  is  equally  noticeable  in  the  speech  of  Englishmen  of 
culture.  Wordsworth  probably  sounded  four  consecutive  lines 
of  the  Ode 

"  0  evil  day !  if  I  were  sullen 
While  earth  herself  is  adornin' 
This  sweet  May  mornin' ; 
And  the  children  are  pullin' 
On  every  side 

In  a  thousand  valleys  far  and  wide, 
Fresh  flowers." 

Neither  was  Scott  a  purist  in  these  matters,  as  he  showed  in  the 
Helvellyn :  yelling  of  his  well-known  poem.  Wordsworth's 
rhyme  for  the  same  mountain  was  dwelling.  Another  Words- 
worthian  bit  of  verbal  music  is  robin :  sobbing.  On  the  other 
hand  his  dames:  Thames  makes  the  American  wonder  whether 
he  has  carefully  been  mispronouncing  the  name  of  the  river,  all 
these  years. 

The  highest  attainment  of  Wordsworth  in  blank  verse  is  the 
final  passage  of  The  Recluse,  which,  in  idea,  is  perhaps  the 
mountain-peak  of  poetic  aspiration  in  English.  Among  his 
rhymed  poems,  notwithstanding  the  majesty  of  some  of  the 
sonnets,  and  the  new  music  and  the  new  thought  of  the  best 
nature-lyrics,  the  Ode  on  Immortality  is  supreme.  In  it  most  of 
the  rhymes  are  normal.  Sea:  jollity  (especially  as  it  comes  in 
the  middle  of  gay :  May :  holiday)  marks  the  end  of  the 


ROMANTIC  RHYME  161 

eighteenth-century  e  in  the  first  word,  which  survived  as  late  as 
Cowper's  survey :  sea.  Call :  festival :  coronal :  all,  and  festival : 
funeral  (compare  Milton's  festival:  hall)  show  the  beauty  of 
lingering  pronunciation  which  was  so  clearly  to  be  displayed, 
again  and  again,  by  Wordsworth,  Shelley,  and  Keats.  He  who 
does  not  read  the  greater  English  romantic  poets  almost  with  a 
drawl  at  times,  loses  much  of  their  music.  Warm:  arm;  one: 
upon :  gone  ;  come :  home  ;  splendid :  attended  ;  song :  tongue : 
long  ;  belie :  immensity  ;  sympathy :  be  ;  eye :  mortality  ;  immor- 
tality :  by  (a  rhyme  never  disused  since  Shakespeare's  day) ; 
creature :  nature ;  weather :  hither  —  all  these  illustrate  the  fact 
that  a  reasonable  similarity  of  sound  was  the  only  thing  asked 
by  the  rhymer. 

Some  lines  are  left  unrhymed;  and  one  of  them,  I  think,  is 
"Heaven  lies  about  us  in  our  infancy,"  though  boy  comes  two 
lines  below  and  joy  two  lines  farther  on.  The  length  of  the  lines 
varies  from  two  feet  to  six;  the  greatest  number  of  lines  between 
rhymes  is  six. 

Wordsworth  does  not  object  to  forgetfulness :  nakedness ;  in 
which,  as  in  almost  every  English  rhyme  of  the  sort,  there  is  a 
pairing  of  ideas  back  of  the  last  syllables,  which  satisfies  the 
reader  as  well  as  a  sound-rhyme.  Nor  does  he  take  any  pains 
to  avoid  assonances  in  adjoining  lines  —  feet :  repeat :  gleam  : 
dream,  etc. 

A  late  survival  of  identical  rhyme  is  one:  won  (The  Happy 
Warrior). 

Sir  Walter  Scott  is  significant  in  the  history  of  rhyme  for  two 
reasons:  he  searched  out,  popularized,  and  made  models  of, 
the  old  ballads  of  the  border,  and  he  made  the  rhymed  octo- 
syllabic couplet  (iambic  tetrameter)  a  more  important  poetic 
vehicle  than  it  had  ever  been.  In  variety  and  melody  his  songs 
were  unsurpassed  by  any  others  of  the  romantic  school.  He 
caught  the  spirit  of  the  old  ballads  and  in  some  ways  improved 
upon  their  form,  —  as  for  instance,  in  the  return,  rather  than 
refrain,  of  "  Oh  Brignall  banks  are  wild  and  fair."  Swift  fusion 
of  thought  and  sound  has  never,  in  English  poetry,  beten  better 
illustrated  than  in  this  poem,  in  which  perfect  and  imperfect 
end-rhymes,  internal  rhymes,  assonances,  and  thought-rhymes 

11 


162  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

are  combined  in  such  a  way  that  the  very  imperfections  of  the 
verse  leave  the  desired  impression  of  irresistible  speed. 

The  four-stressed  rhyming  couplets  of  Mormon,  The  Lady  of 
the  Lake,  and  The  Lay  of  the  Last  Minstrel  were  made  by  Scott 
to  seem  almost  the  indispensable  means  of  combining  vivid  nar- 
ration and  idyllic  description.  If  others  have  not  been  able  to 
repeat  his  success,  as,  indeed,  he  himself  failed  to  do  in  Rokeby, 
it  remains  the  more  significant.1 

An  unusual  rhyme-arrangement  (aaabbbccc)  was  effectively 
used  by  Scott  in  the  Lament  in  The  Lady  of  the  Lake.  A  curious 
rhyme  in  the  same  poem  is 

"And  now  to  issue  from  the  glen, 
No  pathway  meets  the  wanderer's  ken, 
Unless  he  climb,  with  footing  nice, 
A  far-projecting  precipice." 

1  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes,  in  a  short  essay  under  the  attractive  title 
The  Physiology  of  Versification,  presents  the  thesis  that  as  there  are,  for 
the  average  man,  twenty  inspirations  of  breath  and  eighty  heart- 
pulsations  per  minute,  the  octosyllabic  measure  of  Scott  and  others  is 
the  normal  English  line  (with  twenty  lines  and  eighty  accents  to  the 
minute),  the  five-stressed  iambic  pentameter  being  too  long  and  the 
hexameter  worse  yet.  "  It  is  plain,  therefore,  that  if  one  reads  twenty 
lines  in  a  minute,  and  naturally  breathes  the  same  number  of  times 
during  that  minute,  he  will  pronounce  one  line  to  each  expiration,  taking 
advantage  of  the  pause  at  its  close  for  inspiration."  On  the  other  hand, 
in  the  ten-syllable  or  heroic  line  of  Pope's  Homer,  "if  a  breath  is  allowed 
to  each  line  the  respiration  will  be  longer  and  slower  than  natural,  and  a 
sense  of  effort  and  fatigue  will  soon  be  the  consequence."  To  the 
common  metre  of  the  hymn-books  he  allows  "a  line  to  each  expiration," 
which  makes  "exceedingly  easy  reading."  The  twelve-syllable  line  is 
"too  much  for  one  expiration  and  not  enough  for  two,"  and  is  therefore 
"almost  intolerable."  Again,  "one  can  hardly  doubt  that  Spenser 
breathed  habitually  more  slowly  than  Prior,  and  that  Anacreon  had 
a  quicker  respiration  than  Homer."  But  "these  are  only  suggestions  to 
be  considered  and  tested;  the  relations  of  verse  to  the  respiratory 
rhythm  will  be  easily  verified  and  extended  by  any  who  may  care  to 
take  the  trouble." 

Now,  Dr.  Holmes  was  not  only  one  of  the  most  naturally  lyrical  of 
American  poets,  but  also  an  accomplished  physiologist;  so  that  his 
conclusions  are  entitled  to  more  respect  than  those  of  the  layman  in 
verse  and  medicine ;  but  all  that  I  will  do  is  to  ask  the  reader  to  utter 
the  lines  mentioned  and  see  if  he  can,  without  inconvenience,  even 
force  himself  to  inhale  and  exhale  according  to  Dr.  Holmes's  plan.  He 
will  be  much  more  likely  to  read  two  lines  of  Gray's  Elegy,  or  three  of 
Marmion,  with  one  breath,  while  a  single  inspiration  will  be  enough  for 
the  fifteen-syllable  lines  of  Locksley  Hall. 


ROMANTIC  RHYME  163 

War  is  a  necessary  word  with  few  rhymes,  therefore  Scott 
rhymes  it  with  far;  Gray  and  Wordsworth  with  afar;  Cowper 
with  are;  Coleridge  with  far;  and  Byron  with  car. 

In  Scott  and  the  romantic  poets  generally,  final  y  has  no  fixed 
sound,  being  either  the  sound  in  high  or  that  in  see,  as  the  rhyme 
demands;  thus  Scott  has  eye:  vacancy;  Hogg  e'e:  sea;  Byron 
and  Wordsworth  eye:  Emily;  Keats  key :  minstrelsy ;  Rogers 
eye :  minstrelsy.  As  I  have  already  said,  in  English  —  unlike 
Italian  or  French  —  the  variety  of  pronunciation,  and  also  of 
rhyme-pairing,  has  always  been  so  great  as  to  make  it 
difficult  to  prove  a  given  pronunciation  by  rhyme-uses  at  a 
given  time. 

"The  master  of  masters,  who  is  Coleridge"  (Swinburne)  is 
a  good  illustration  of  the  liberty  with  which  the  greater  English 
poets  have  used  many  means  toward  the  one  result  of  the  en- 
richment of  the  world  by  imaginative  expression.  He  was  in- 
fluential because  of  his  insistence  upon  that  old  freedom  which 
he  mistakenly  regarded  as  a  discovery.  "The  metre  of  Christa- 
bel,"  said  he  in  the  preface  to  that  poem,  "is  not,  properly  speak- 
ing, irregular,  though  it  may  seem  so  from  its  being  founded  on 
a  new  principle :  namely,  that  of  counting  in  each  line  the  accents, 
not  the  syllables.  Though  the  latter  may  vary  from  seven  to 
twelve,  yet  in  each  line  the  accents  will  be  found  to  be  only  four." 
This  was  nothing  but  the  "tumbling  verse  "  of  the  sixteenth 
century,  mentioned  by  King  James. 

Such  intentional  freedom  was  not  accompanied  by  extraordi- 
nary variations  from  rhyme-usage.  We  have  forced :  burst ; 
gusht:dust;  heart :  desert ;  brow:  glow;  yesternight :  knight ; 
but  as  a  rule  Coleridge's  ear  seemed  naturally  to  guide  him  to 
those  rhymes  which  fastidious  usage  calls  "perfect."  It  would 
be  hard  to  find,  in  a  poem  of  equal  length,  a  less  criticisable  list 
than  those  in  Love,  which,  in  order,  are  as  follows :  frame :  flame  ; 
hour :  tower  ;  eve :  Genevieve  ;  knight :  light ;  Genevieve :  grieve  ; 
story :  hoary  ;  grace :  face  ;  brand :  land  ;  tone :  own  ;  grace :  face  ; 
knight : night ;  shade:  glade;  bright :  knight ;  band:  land;  vain: 
brain  ;  away :  lay  ;  ditty :  pity  ;  Genevieve :  eve  ;  throng :  long  ; 
shame :  name  ;  stept :  wept ;  embrace :  face  ;  art :  heart ;  pride : 
bride.  But,  though  sparingly,  this  leader  did  not  hesitate  to 


164 

use  "the  half-rhyme,  or  incomplete  rhyme,  which  has  an  irre- 
sistible charm."  Taste,  after  all,  is  the  arbiter  of  beauty. 

Southey's  Lodore  illustrates  that  prodigality  in  rhyme-effects 
which  was  a  characteristic  of  the  romantic  revival,  and  which 
was  to  appear  later  in  the  humorous  work  of  Barham,  Mahony, 
and  Lowell.  In  general,  unusual  or  forced  rhymes,  such  as  his 
gentleman :  cane,  or  care  I :  Mary,  are  suitable  only  for  light  or 
jocose  work,  or  for  semi-satirical  poems  like  Byron's  Don 
Juan. 

George  Ticknor  traces  the  "riotous  waste  of  rhymes  "  in 
Southey's  Curse  of  Kehama  —  which  Southey  himself  called 
"  crypto-rhymes,"  "uniting  the  advantage  of  rhyme  with  the 
strength  and  freedom  of  blank  verse  in  a  manner  peculiar  to 
itself  "  —  back  to  the  Spanish  poet  Garcilasso's  rhymes  between 
the  end  of  one  line  and  the  middle  of  the  next : 

f'Albanio,  si  tu  mal  comunicdros 
Con  otro,  que  pensdras,  que  tu  pena 
Juzgara  como  agena,  o  que  esto  fuego,"  etc. 

Concerning  this  Ticknor  says:  "Wherever  the  rhyme  is  quite 
obvious  the  effect  is  not  good,  and  where  it  is  little  noticed  the 
lines  take  rather  the  character  of  blank  verse." 

A  rhyme  in  Campbell  of  a  sort  not  noted  hitherto  is  AcJiaians: 
defiance. 

Lamb,  in  his  few  verses,  chiefly  deserves  notice  because  of  the 
surprising  triumph  of  The  Old  Familiar  Faces  —  one  of  the  few 
admirable  unrhymed  lyrics  in  the  language,  with  a  nobly  used 
refrain,  and  written  in  melodious  six-stressed  measure.  The 
rhymes  in  his  tender  lyric  Hester  are  free ;  thus  he  gives  endeavor  : 
together;  spirit :  inherit ;  rule :  cool :  school ;  blest  her:  Hester. 
Dash :  wash,  elsewhere,  is  one  of  his  rhymes  that  seems  pecu- 
liarly objectionable,  notwithstanding  our  general  historic  plea 
for  freedom. 

It  is  natural  to  find  in  Moore,  by  intent,  the  dropping  of  g's :  — 

'.' I  have  found  out  a  gift  for  my  Erin, 

A  gift  that  will  surely  content  her;  — 
Sweet  pledge  of  a  love  so  endearing  ! 

Five  millions  of  bullets  I  've  sent  her,"  — 


ROMANTIC  RHYME  165 

or  an  occasional  laurel :  moral,  etc. ;  but  in  general  he  was  not 
unconventional.  Regarding  the  larger  question  of  his  music,  I 
cannot  do  better  than  quote  from  his  latest  biographer : 

"It  is  Moore's  great  distinction  that  he  brought  into  English 
verse  something  of  the  variety  and  multiplicity  of  musical 
rhythms.  When  the  Irish  Melodies  began  to  appear,  it  is  no 
wonder  that  readers  should  have  been  dazzled  by  the  skill  with 
which  a  profusion  of  metres  were  handled ;  and  the  poet  showed 
himself  even  more  inventive  in  rhythms  than  in  stanzas.  The 
most  curious  part  of  the  matter  is  that  Moore  was  really  import- 
ing into  English  poetry  some  of  the  characteristics  of  a  literature 
which  he  did  not  know.  He  had  not  a  word  of  Gaelic,  and  (like 
O'Connell)  desired  to  see  it  die  out.  He  observes  that  Spanish 
alone  of  European  metrical  systems  employs  '  assonantic '  in- 
stead of  consonantic  rhyme,  though  he  was  bred  in  a  country 
where  rhyme  of  this  order  had  been  brought  to  an  extraordinary 
pitch  of  perfection.  But  he  based  his  work  upon  Irish  tunes, 
composed  in  the  primitive  manner,  before  music  was  divorced 
from  poetry.  One  may  say,  virtually,  that  in  fitting  words  to 
these  tunes,  here  produced  in  English  the  rhythms  of  Irish  folk- 
song." * 

Byron's  management  of  the  Spenserian  stanza,  in  Childe 
Harold's  Pilgrimage,  was  marked  by  a  freedom  of  rhythm  and 
rhyme  distinctly  modern,  as  compared  with  that  of  all  previous 
users  of  the  stanza.  The  ottava  rima  of  Don  Juan  was  made  to 
lend  itself  to  jocosity  and  satire  of  every  kind,  written  almost  as 
an  improvisatore  might  have  done.  Such  rhymes  as  Acropolis: 
Constantinople  is :  metropolis ;  laureate:  Tory  at:  are  ye  at;  in- 
tellectual:  hen-pecked  you  all;  appearance :  year  hence,  may  be 
taken  as  specimens  of  hundreds.  To  Byron's  conscious  and 
unconscious  imitators,  during  the  Byronic  period,  they  were  a 
constant  model  or  temptation.  Tame  beside  them  appeared  his 
sword :  lord  ;  appendix :  index  ;  faith :  death  ;  mood :  blood  ; 
athwart :  part ;  none:  stone;  gone:  sun;  beneath :  breathe  ;  wolf: 
gulf;  owl:  soul;  he:  Nineveh  (suggestive  of  Rossetti). 

In  particular,  Byron  deserves  praise  for  the  new  melody  he 
drew  from  feminine  rhymes  in  English.  The  following  (distinctly 

1  STEPHEN  GWYNNE:  Thomas  Moore  (English  Men  of  Letters  series). 


166  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

a  forerunner  of  Swinburne)  is  in  itself  enough  to  confute  the  old 
idea  that  they  are  necessarily  trivial : 

"We  sate  down  and  wept  by  the  waters 

Of  Babel,  and  thought  of  the  day 
When  our  foe,  in  the  hue  of  his  slaughters 

Made  Salem's  high  places  his  prey; 
And  ye,  oh  her  desolate  daughters, 

Were  scattered  all  weeping  away." 

Still  more  anticipatory  of  Swinburne's  most  characteristic 
devices  of  metre,  alliteration,  and  alternate  arrangement  of 
feminine  rhymes  in  an  eight-line  stanza  are  the  Stanzas  to 
Augusta,  of  which  I  quote  the  first  and  the  last : 

f  Though  the  day  of  my  destiny 's  over, 

And  the  star  of  my  fate  hath  declined, 
Thy  soft  heart  refused  to  discover 

The  faults  which  so  many  could  find ; 
Though  thy  soul  with  my  grief  was  acquainted, 

It  shrunk  not  to  share  it  with  me, 
And  the  love  which  my  spirit  hath  painted 

It  never  hath  found  but  in  thee." 

"From  the  wreck  of  the  past,  which  hath  perished, 

Thus  much  I  at  least  may  recall, 
It  hath  taught  me  that  what  I  most  cherished 

Deserved  to  be  dearest  of  all : 
In  the  desert  a  fountain  is  springing, 

In  the  wide  waste  there  still  is  a  tree, 
And  a  bird  in  the  solitude  singing 

Which  speaks  to  my  spirit  of  thee." 

The  aptness  of  rhyme  and  stanza  in  The  Destruction  of  Sen- 
nacherib ;  Oh  talk  not  to  me  of  a  name  great  in  story  ;  the  Shelleyan 
There  be  none  of  beauty's  daughters;  There  's  not  a  joy  the  world 
can  give;  or  When  we  two  parted,  shows  that  Byron,  with  all 
his  superficiality  and  limitations,  left  English  verse  much  richer 
than  he  found  it. 

Shelley  was  one  of  the  larger  influences  toward  rhyme-freedom 
in  the  nineteenth  century.  In  his  rhymes,  more  than  in  those  of 
the  majority  of  poets,  we  are  reminded  of  the  necessity  of  that 
slow  pronunciation  which  gives  full  value  to  each  sound.  If 
rapidly  read,  To  a  Skylark  —  which  may  be  called  the  credo  of 
the  romantic  school  —  loses  half  its  beauty.  Take,  for  instance, 
the  first  and  fourteenth  stanzas: 


ROMANTIC  RHYME  167 

"Hail  to  thee,  blithe  spirit  1 

Bird  thou  never  wert 
That  from  heaven  or  near  it, 

Pourest  thy  full  heart 
In  profuse  strains  of  unpremeditated  art." 

"Chorus  hymeneal 

Or  triumphal  chaunt 
Matched  with  thine  would  be  all 

But  an  empty  vaunt  — 
A  thing  wherein  we  feel  there  is  some  hidden  want." 

Again  a  kind  of  lingering  lusciousness  of  utterance  seems  to  be 
demanded  by,  and  to  inhere  in,  such  rhymes  as  intense:  omni- 
presence; dread :  entered  ;  floods :  solitudes  ;  clear :  traveller :  hair  ; 
song :  strung  ;  stone :  frown  ;  appear :  despair :  bare  ;  pursuing : 
ruin  ;  higher :  fire  ;  not :  blot :  thought :  what ;  standard :  wan- 
dered; ray:  array;  motion :  emotion. 

Another  element  in  Shelley's  rhymes  is  a  silvery  clearness  of 
sound  which  seems  to  give  new  value  to  consonants,  not  only  in 
such  obvious  places  as 

"Sound  of  vernal  showers 

On  the  twinkling  grass, 
Rain-awakened  flowers, 

All  that  ever  was 
Joyous,  and  clear,  and  fresh,  thy  music  doth  surpass," 

but  in  such  a  stanza  as 

"Swiftly  walk  over  the  western  wave, 

Spirit  of  Night ! 
Out  of  the  misty  eastern  cave 
Where,  all  the  long  and  lone  daylight, 
Thou  wo  vest  dreams  of  joy  and  fear 
Which  make  thee  terrible  and  dear,  — 

Swift  be  thy  flight!" 

In  this  poem  —  To  the  Night  —  alliteration,  assonance,  and  end- 
rhyme  are  so  blended  that  the  reader  scarcely  notices  where  one 
or  another  of  them  is  introduced. 

Although,  in  such  a  line  as  the  fourth  of  the  stanza  just  quoted, 
Shelley  never  hesitates  to  alter  a  final  accent  for  the  sake  of  an 
effective  rhyme,  his  feminine  rhymes  are  usually  unwrenched 
from  their  normal  accents.  Thus  in  The  Flight  of  Love,  the 
feminine  rhymes,  in  order,  are  shattered :  scattered ;  broken: 


168  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

spoken  ;  splendour :  render  ;  dirges :  surges  ;  min  gled :  sin  gled ; 
bewailest :  frailest ;  rock  thee:mock  thee;  rafter :  laughter.  The 
very  rhymes  themselves,  without  the  rest  of  the  poem,  remind  us 
how  strong  was  Shelley's  influence  upon  many  later  nineteenth- 
century  poets.  After  him,  at  any  rate,  nobody  could  say  that  the 
feminine  rhyme  was  inconsistent  with  seriousness,  dignity, 
beauty,  or  even  melancholy.  By  demanding  freedom  in  all 
matters  of  accent,  number  of  syllables  in  the  line,  rhyme-sound, 
and  rhyme-arrangement,  Shelley,  not  less  than  the  great  leader 
Coleridge,  left  in  the  minds  of  subsequent  English  poets  the 
thought  that  the  wing  of  rhyme,  like  that  of  Love  in  Campbell's 
poem, 

"moults  when  caged  and  captured; 
Only  free,  he  soars  enraptured." 

In  Adonais  are  six  identical  rhymes.  The  Cloud  is  a  compara- 
tively early  example  of  copious  internal  rhyme. 

To  the  student  who  would  get  the  quintessence  of  Shelley's 
methods  as  poet,  versifier,  and  rhymer,  I  commend  the  lines 
beginning  "Life  of  life,  thy  lips  enkindle"  (Voice  in  the  Air, 
Singing,"  in  Prometheus  Unbound,  II,  v,  which  Palgrave  calls 
"Hymn  to  the  Spirit  of  Nature"  x) ;  or  To  Jane. 

The  rhymes  of  Keats  are  strongly  illustrative  of  romantic 
freedom.  Take  St.  Agnes'  Eve  as  an  example:  we  find  Made- 
line: divine  and  also  Madeline:  unseen;  was:  grass;  cavalier: 
otherwhere;  foul:  soul;  beyond :  bland ;  moon:  crone;  ears: 
bears;  secrecy : privacy.  In  the  Ode  to  a  Nightingale  are  die: 
ecstasy;  abroad:  sod;  path:  hath.  In  the  Ode  on  a  Grecian 
Urn  are  Arcady :  ecstasy ;  on:  tone;  priest:  drest;  unheard: 
endear' d;  moon:  return.  In  the  Ode  to  Psyche  are  too:  adieu; 
hierarchy :  sky ;  none:  moan.  In  To  Autumn  are  trees:  bees: 
cease.  In  the  Ode  on  Melancholy  are  yewberries:  mysteries; 
be  .'drowsily;  owl:  soul;  peonies:  eyes.  Some  other  rhymes  are 
essences :  lees  ;  innumerable :  tell ;  gone :  known  ;  dead :  mead  ; 
prest :  amethyst ;  moon :  thereon  ;  gourd :  curd  ;  form :  worm : 
deform;  Maia:Baiae. 

1  A  surprising  thing  is  that  Palgrave  omitted  this  in  later  editions  of 
The  Golden  Treasury,  by  the  advice  of  Tennyson. 


ROMANTIC  RHYME  169 

In  the  stanza  arrangements  of  these  odes  Keats  follows  neither 
the  Horatian,  the  Pindaric,  nor  any  familiar  irregular  method; 
but,  while  retaining  the  strict  stanza  form,  with  a  uniform  num- 
ber of  feet  in  each  line  and  of  lines  in  each  stanza,  varies  the 
rhyme-arrangement  at  will.  Thus  in  the  Ode  on  a  Grecian  Urn 
the  arrangement  is  as  follows:  —  stanza  1,  ababcdedce;  stanza  2, 
ababcdeced;  stanza  3,  ababcdecde;  stanza  4,  ababcdecde;  stanza 
5,  ababcdedce. 

Keats  took  no  pains  to  avoid  assonance  in  adjoining  rhymed 
lines.  Thus  we  have  in  the  Ode  to  Psyche,  trees :  steep :  bees : 
sleep;  brain:  name:  feign:  same.  After  patient  study  of  asso- 
nance from  the  earliest  to  the  latest  times,  one  must  reach  the 
conclusion  that  it  is  now  a  nearly  negligible  thing,  in  the  verse- 
art  of  most  English  poets.  It  does  not  occur  often  enough,  or 
regularly  enough,  to  give  evidence  that  it  has  frequently  been 
prized  as  a  beauty;  nor,  on  the  other  hand,  is  it  sedulously 
avoided.  Keats  evidently  enjoyed  it,  especially  when  a  languor- 
ous effect  was  sought.1  Gifford  thought  that  many  of  Keats's 
images  in  Endymion  looked  as  though  they  had  been  suggested 
by  the  rhymes  themselves.  "Rhyme,"  said  he,  "may  incline  the 
balance";  but  the  poet's  art  lies  "in  making  the  deflection  [to 
the  necessities  of  rhyme  and  metre]  as  little  conspicuous  as 
possible." 

A  noteworthy  element  in  Keats's  use  of  the  rhyming  couplet  is 
the  essential  unimportance  of  the  rhyme,  oftentimes,  as  a  marker 
of  sense.  In  the  famous  opening  lines  of  Endymion,  for  instance, 
the  running-over  is  so  constant  that  the  rhymes  become  only 
a  sort  of  undertone  of  agreeable  music. 

One  of  the  most  beautiful  of  thought-rhyme  cadences,  and  at 
the  same  time  one  of  the  most  obvious  illustrations  of  tone-color, 
is  the  well-known  end  of  stanza  7  and  beginning  of  stanza  8  of 
the  Ode  to  a  Nightingale : 

."Charm'd  magic  casements,  opening  on  the  foam 
Of  perilous  seas,  in  faery  lands  forlorn. 

"  Forlorn  !  the  very  word  is  like  a  bell 

To  toll  me  back  from  thee  to  my  sole  self." 

1  See  page  30  sqq. 


170  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

This  repeated  word  forlorn,  on  which  Keats  so  finely  dwelt, 
suggests  a  brief  mention  of  a  large  subject.  Tone-color  is  an  un- 
questionable thing,  and  one  closely  connected  with  rhyme. 
Some  of  the  "symbolists"  have  gone  so  far  as  to  connect  particular 
sounds  with  particular  colors.  Such  a  word  as  forlorn  pos- 
sibly suggests  purple  or  blue,  as  such  a  word  as  splendid  may 
suggest  the  glitter  of  bright  hues;  but  those  who  pursue  the 
inquiry  soon  get  into  the  region  where  no  two  persons  agree  as 
to  facts  or  fancies. 

Of  course  there  is  a  difference  in  color  between  Poe's  line  — 
so  much  admired  by  Mr.  Andrew  Lang  —  "The  viol,  the  violet, 
and  the  vine,"  and  Browning's  "Gr-r-r  —  there,  go,  my  heart's 
abhorrence."  Equally  of  course  there  are  onomatopoetic  words 
like  whizz,  bang,  thud,  and  a  hundred  more.  Boom,  for  instance, 
contains  the  three  sounds,  in  order,  attending  the  firing  of  a 
cannon.  But  we  do  not  go  very  far  before  we  reach  words 
which,  melodious  or  not  in  themselves,  strongly  suggest  inherent 
ideas.  Dark,  to  take  the  first  one  that  comes  to  mind,  is  sweetly 
musical  as  well  as  pictorially  impressive;  and  it  would  be  easy 
to  found  a  scheme  of  tone-color  on  it  alone.  But,  unfortunately, 
mark  is  still  more  musical,  and  yet,  because  of  its  meaning, 
destitute  of  tone-color  effects.  Nor  in  stark  has  the  explosive 
any  function.  Bark  (ship)  and  bark  (of  a  dog)  depend  wholly 
on  their  meanings  for  any  result  on  the  mind.  Hark  might 
be  selected  as  being  completely  unified  in  sound  and  sense,  while 
lark  also  suggests  tonality;  but  park,  beginning  with  a  smart 
labial-explosive,  has  no  onomatopoetic  power.  Furthermore, 
while  ah  may  perhaps  be  closer  to  a  purple  effect  than  see,  no  two 
writers  on  the  subject,  from  Lord  Bacon  to  Stephane  MaHamae", 
will  agree  on  the  color-labels  to  attach  to  any  two  sounds  in  any 
language.  Clearly,  "the  subject  remains  to  be  investigated." 

Poe's  statement  as  to  the  way  in  which  The  Raven  was  built 
up  is  well  known ;  and  Walter  Crane,  in  his  Reminiscences,  says 
that  Tennyson  read  his  own  poetry  aloud  in  a  deep  voice,  in  a 
way  that  reminded  one  of  his  description,  in  the  M orte  d' Arthur, 
of  the  manner  in  which  Everard  Hall 

"  read,  mouthing  out  his  hollow  o's  and  o's, 
Deep-chested  music." 


ROMANTIC  RHYME  171 

It  is  interesting  to  see  how  many  of  the  most  enduringly  popular 
songs  of  England  and  America,  for  the  past  hundred  years,  have 
had,  in  title  or  refrain,  the  long  vowels  and  liquids  that  make  the 
most  sonorous  rhymes.  Take,  for  instance,  those  bringing  in 
the  thought  and  utterance  of  the  word  "old":  Beginning  with 
Auld  Lang  Syne  and  Auld  Robin  Gray,  we  have  The  Old  Folks 
at  Home,  The  Old  Oaken  Bucket,  Old  Uncle  Ned,  My  Old 
Kentucky  Home,  Tenting  on  the  Old  Camp  Ground,  and  many 
others.  Long  o  is  the  dominant  sound  of  Ben  Bolt,  Home,  Sweet 
Home,  The  Last  Rose  of  Summer,  and  Tennyson's  Sweet  and  Low. 
The  similar  au  is  the  note  of  Annie  Laurie.  Liquids  and  long 
vowels  dominate  The  Land  o'  the  Leal,  Drink  to  me  only  with 
thine  eyes,  Flow  gently,  sweet  Afton,  and  The  Harp  that  once 
through  Tara's  halls.  Hard  times,  hard  times,  come  again  no 
more  is  one  of  the  many  songs  depending  upon  the  most  effective 
single  refrain  in  English.  "  No  more  —  all  hell  is  writ  in  those 
two  words";  but  they  may  also  be  turned  into  a  thought  of 
triumphant  mastery  over  present  woe. 

Thomas  Hood,  who  may  be  called  the  last  of  the  romantic 
school  proper,  was  a  minor  poet  who  wrote  two  enduring  master- 
pieces of  melody.  The  Bridge  of  Sighs  stands  alone  in  the 
anthology  of  the  nineteenth  century.  One  of  its  features  —  a 
deliberate  use  of  assonance  —  shows  that  Hood  was  an  exception 
to  the  general  remark  just  made  on  that  subject.  There  can  be 
no  question  of  the  intention,  or  of  the  success,  of  garments: 
cerements;  constantly :  instantly;  evidence :  eminence :  providence. 
Among  the  end-rhymes  are  humbly : dumbly ;  humanly. 'wo- 
manly; dishonor :  on  her  ;  casement :  basement :  amazement. 

An  early  example  of  the  repetend  is 

"Loop  up  her  tresses 

Escaped  from  the  comb, 
Her  fair  auburn  tresses ; 
Whilst  wonderment  guesses 
Where  was  her  home?" 

Hood's  Past  and  Present  —  in  its  different  way  not  less  valu- 
able than  The  Bridge  of  Sighs  —  is  an  excellent  example  of  a 
poem  that  rhymes  throughout  in  both  ways :  in  thought  and  in 
corresponding  expression.  An  apparent  indication  that  it  was 


172  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

rapidly  written  is  found  in  the  imperfect  internal  rhyme  in  the 
next-to-the-last  line  of  the  third  stanza: 

"And  summer  pools  could  hardly  cool 
The  fever  on  my  brow." 

The  consecutive  high :  sky :  joy :  boy  of  the  last  stanza  indicates 
that  in  Hood's  day  the  ai  sound  of  joy,  etc.,  no  longer  existed.1 

Hood,  by  the  way,  once  produced  what  is  a  strong  candidate 
—  even  when  we  remember  the  later  cacophonies  of  the  Brown- 
ings —  for  the  place  of  the  worst  rhyme  (not  jocosely  intended) 
in  the  language.  It  occurs  in  his  imaginative  poem  The  Elm 
Tree,  evidently  written  under  the  influence  of  Coleridge: 

"The  pines  —  those  old  gigantic  pines, 

That  writhe  —  recalling  soon 
The  famous  human  group  that  writhes 

With  snakes  in  wild  festoon  — 
In  ramous  wrestlings  interlaced, 

A  forest  Laocoon. 

1  A  parody  is  a  sort  of  elaborated  rhyme,  in  which  there  is  a  series  of 
contrasts  between  the  ideas  of  the  one  poem  and  those  of  the  other, 
place  by  place.  Thus  Miss  Carolyn  Wells  begins  her  parody  of  Hood's 
Past  and  Present; 

"I  remember,  I  remember 

The  flat  where  I  was  born: 
The  little  air-shaft  where  the  sun 
Could  not  peep  in  at  morn ; " 

and  ends  it  with 

"I  live  in  first-floor  chambers  now, 

With  nothing  to  annoy, 
But  still  I  'm  farther  off  from  heaven 
Than  when  I  was  a  boy." 


X 

MODERN  RHYME 

INFLUENCES  in  poetry  cannot  infallibly  be  traced; 

"For  who  has  sight  so  keen  and  strong 
That  it  can  follow  the  flight  of  song?" 

But  after  Wordsworth  came  Bryant;  after  Shelley  Poe;  and 
after  Keats  Tennyson.  Bryant  in  turn  affected  the  youthful 
Longfellow,  until  he  came  under  the  power  of  Heine ;  nor  would 
the  pre-Raphaelite  school  of  English  poets  have  been  quite  the 
same  had  Tennyson  never  written  Mariana,  The  Sisters,  and 
St.  Agnes'  Eve. 

Neither  can  schools  of  poetry  be  neatly  assigned  to  chronologi- 
cal limits.  Rogers,  who  may  be  considered  the  last  survival  of 
the  eighteenth-century  school,  died  as  late  as  1855 ;  Wordsworth 
was  still  poet-laureate  in  1850;  and  Hunt,  whom  the  Quarterly 
Review,  in  its  famous  onslaught  on  Keats,  had  declared  to  be 
much  superior  to  him,  though  possessing  all  his  characteristic 
faults,  survived  until  the  eve  of  the  American  Civil  War. 

The  first  American  poem  to  win  and  retain  a  place  in  the  history 
of  English  literature  was  Bryant's  Thanatopsis  —  in  every  way 
a  dignified  piece  of  blank  verse.  But  when  it  orginally  appeared 
(in  The  North  American  Review  for  September,  1817)  it  was  in  a 
form  very  different  from  that  in  which  it  has  so  long  been  known. 
It  began  with  four  four-line  iambic  pentameter  stanzas,  rhymed 
abab.  Then  came,  by  an  abrupt  change,  in  blank  verse  to  the 
end,  the  germ  of  the  poem  as  we  have  it  at  present.  In  this 
original  shape  the  now  famous  beginning  and  ending  were 
lacking ;  the  rhymed  stanzas  were  weak ;  and  between  them  and 
the  added  blank  verse  there  was  no  more  unity  of  form  than 
would  have  been  shown  had  a  page  of  Gray's  Elegy  been  com- 


174  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

bined  with  a  page  of  Blair's  Grave,  as  constituting  a  single 
poem.1 

Somfe  of  the  earlier  and  less  important  poems  of  Longfellow, 
both  in  rhyme  and  in  blank  verse,  were,  as  had  been  said,  im- 
mediately affected  by  the  work  of  Bryant.  Longfellow's  was 
always  a  receptive  mind;  and  when,  before  he  was  twenty,  he 
was  beginning  his  poetical  career,  Bryant  loomed  large  on  the 
American  literary  horizon.  But  Longfellow  soon  turned  to  the 
kind  of  work  by  which  he  is  best  known,  and  which  does  not  in 
the  least  suggest  his  eminent  predecessor. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  no  poet  of  rank,  since  the  dismal 
days  of  the  Elizabethan  anti-rhymers,  so  extensively  and  so 
successfully  experimented  in  other  unrhymed  measures  than 
blank  verse.  To  an  Old  Danish  Song-Book  (trochaic),  The 
Grave  (translated  from  Old  English),  Tegner's  Drapa  ("  in  the 
spirit  of  the  old  Norse  poetry"),  The  Children  of  the  Lord's 
Supper  (hexameter),  and  other  translated  or  original  pieces, 
showed  his  fondness  for  such  work  before  the  two  long  poems 

1  The  rhymed  introduction,  as  originally  printed,  was  as  follows : 
"  THANATOPSIS 

"Not  that  from  life,  and  all  its  woes 

The  hand  of  death  shall  set  me  free; 
Not  that  this  head  shall  then  repose 
In  the  low  vale  most  peacefully. 

"Ah,  when  I  touch  time's  farthest  brink, 

A  kinder  solace  must  attend ; 
It  chills  my  very  soul  to  think 
On  that  dread  hour  when  life  must  end. 

"In  vain  the  flattering  verse  may  breathe 
Of  ease  from  pain  and  rest  from  strife; 
There  is  a  sacred  dread  of  death 
Inwoven  with  the  strings  of  life. 

"This  bitter  cup  at  first  was  given 

When  angry  justice  frown'd  severe, 
And  't  is  th'  eternal  doom  of  heaven 
That  man  must  view  the  grave  with  fear. 

"Yet  a  few  days,  and  thee 
The  all-beholding  sun  shall  see  no  more  "...  etc. 

The  poem  closed  with  the  broken  line 

"And  make  their  bed  with  thee." 


MODERN  RHYME  175 

by  which  his  fame  was  so  widely  spread:  Evangeline  and 
Hiawatha.  The  hexameters  of  Evangeline,  with  some  occasional 
roughness,  proved  to  have  a  fitness  for  idyllic  description  not 
discovered  by  previous  experimenters  in  a  verse-form  that  was, 
and  is,  generally  unsuitable  for  English  use.1  Its  employment 
by  Longfellow  as  the  vehicle  (in  The  Courtship  of  Miles  Stan- 
dish)  for  detailed  humor  we  now  see  to  have  been  a  mistake ; 
indeed,  humor  was  never  one  of  Longfellow's  strongest  powers. 
The  four-stressed  trochaics  of  Hiawatha,  with  their  fitness  for 
the  parallelisms  and  repetitions  so  germane  to  the  Indian  mind 
and  so  advantageous  in  a  poem  needing  to  include  explanatory 
translations,  proved  to  be,  as  Longfellow  said  when  he  hit  on 
the  metre  while  reading  the  Kalevala,  exactly  suitable  for  the 
designed  purpose. 

Longfellow's  fondness  for  freeing  himself  from  the  fetters  of 
rhyme  also  appeared  in  some  of  his  rhymed  work ;  for  instance, 
in  parts  of  The  Saga  of  King  Olaf,  where  the  movement  some- 
times dominates  the  technically  rhyming  syllables.  Of  all 
Longfellow's  unrhymed  poems  the  best  is  The  Bells  of  Lynn, 
with  its  melodious  refrain.  In  his  finest  lyric  of  all,  —  My 
Lost  Youth,  —  though  the  poem  itself  is  otherwise  rhymed 
throughout,  he  found  a  prose  recurrence  ready  to  his  hand,  con- 
stituting one  of  the  most  effective  thought-markers  to  be  found 
in  modern  verse. 

When  Emerson,  the  prophet  and  poet  of  individualism,  ideal- 
ism, and  optimism,  wished  to  preach  or  portray  with  special 
conciseness,  he  fell  naturally  into  a  rhythmical  form  of  expression. 
Writing,  as  he  always  did,  "for  thought,  and  not  praise,"  he 
was  careless  concerning  the  number  of  stresses  in  the  line,  or  the 
nature  and  arrangement  of  rhymes.  Few  poets  have  used  a 
greater  variety  of  lilts.  Like  the  old  improvisatori,  he  chanted 
until  he  had  sung  his  song.  Sometimes  he  was  as  regular  as 
in  the  Concord  Hymn;  sometimes  as  loose  as  in  the  Earth-Song 
of  Hamatreya.  The  music  of  Good-Bye,  or  The  Rhodora,  is  so 

1  Swinburne  declared  himself  unable  to  scan  Arnold's  hexameters, 
and  said:  "At  best  what  ugly  bastards  of  verse  are  these  self-styled 
hexameters !  how  human  tongues  or  hands  could  utter  or  could  write 
them  except  by  way  of  burlesque  improvisation  I  could  never  imagine, 
and  never  shall." 


176  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

unquestionable  that  we  are  left  certain  that  Emerson's  rough- 
ness in  verse  was  due  either  to  indifference  to  externals  or  to  a 
sense  of  satisfaction  in  Saxon  straightforwardness  of  expression. 
Excessive  strength  sometimes  pleases  by  its  very  force,  just  as 
undue  mellifluousness  cloys. 

Thus  the  rhyme-uses  of  the  leader  of  the  Transcendental 
school  of  American  poets  were  free  in  the  extreme  —  freer,  on 
the  whole,  than  those  of  his  associates  and  followers.  Of  all 
the  school,  Jones  Very  was  the  truest  master  of  form,  and  the 
only  one  who  could  be  trusted  to  write  a  first-rate  sonnet.  The 
strength  of  The  Dial  contributors  lay  in  prose ;  deeply  influenced 
by  Coleridge,  there  was  no  Coleridge  among  them.  Yet  two 
bits  from  The  Dial,  aside  from  Emerson's  contributions,  have 
justly  passed  into  the  collections  of  familiar  quotations,  and 
both  are  rhymed.  One  is  Cranch's 

."Thought  is  deeper  than  all  speech, 
Feeling  deeper  than  all  thought; 
Souls  to  souls  can  never  teach 
What  unto  themselves  was  taught;" 

the  other  Ellen  Sturgis  Hooper's 

"I  slept,  and  dreamed  that  life  was  beauty; 
I  waked,  and  found  that  life  was  duty." 

Some  of  Emerson's  more  unusual  rhymes  are  mace :  conveys  : 
blaze;  use:  (noun)  muse;  romance :  clans ;  vice:  ties;  wars: 
remorse  ;  oreads :  arcades  ;  patriots :  roots  ;  libraries :  diction- 
aries; woods:  roads;  coats:  spots;  zones:  towns;  cavaliers: 
travellers  ;  fairies :  contraries  ;  resorts :  thoughts  ;  hours :  years : 
doors  ;  tones :  cotyledons  ;  Nemesis :  redresses  ;  heats :  violets  ; 
solitudes : underwoods ;  bells :  daffodels  (sic):  science :  clairvoy- 
ance; unites :  opposites ;  rude:  wood;  gloom:  come;  cloud: 
blood  ;  foot :  fruit ;  foot :  note  ;  shoot :  compute  ;  not :  mote :  note  ; 
shoon:on;  none: union  (compare  Milton's  alone: union);  sun: 
dominion;  go:  whereto;  antipode :  glowed ;  odd  .-period;  be- 
yond :  bound  ;  lost :  coast ;  thought :  not ;  power :  emperor  ;  cow  : 
caribou;  come :  hum :  martyrdom  ;  atmosphere :  air  ;  seer  .'phil- 
osopher; are:  war;  art:  bard;  Porto  Rique  (sic) :  seek;  hope: 
up;  honey:  agrimony;  waste:  passed  (this  was  a  good  rhyme  in 
Shakespeare's  day) ;  swamp :  lamp ;  dark :  clerk  (surviving  English 


MODERN  RHYME  177 

pronunciation);  scarf :  wharf  ;  breath :  bequeath ;  kite:  freight: 
parasite;  put:  nut;  again:  men;  amain:  again  (same  poem); 
wine:  time;  privilege :  liege ;  realm:  film;  divided :  united. 

The  gem  of  the  Emersonian  collection  is  draw :  proprietor. 

Of  the  American  choir,  Whittier  seems  to  have  had  the  least 
trustworthy  ear.  The  whole  trend  of  the  present  review  of  the 
general  subject  is  to  show  the  widespread  —  almost  the  universal 
—  assertion,  by  the  poets,  of  the  right  to  use  means  toward  ends 
as  they  choose,  obeying  the  general  law,  but  violating  it  in  the 
particular.  Yet  when  a  poet,  as  did  Whittier,  writes  in  conven- 
tional metres  and  uses  the  ordinary  verse-machinery  for  the  utter- 
ance of  common  emotions  of  humanity,  we  do  not  expect  him 
to  claim  the  freedom  of  a  Blake,  a  Coleridge,  or  an  Emerson. 
War :  law  and  dawn :  morn,  notwithstanding  the  weakening  of  r 
in  England  and  New  England,  are  not  yet  good  usage.  Abroad: 
lord  is  made  no  more  euphonious  because  it  is  also  used  by  Kip- 
ling. Another  Whittier  rhyme  is  dumb :  lyceum.  But  in  charity 
we  may  remember  Crashaw's  wishes :  blisses :  kisses,  and  Her- 
rick's  goes :  flows :  clothes. 

Whittier's  liberality  as  a  rhymer  may  fairly  be  illustrated  by 
turning  not  to  his  earliest  or  obscurest  lyrics,  but  to  a  few  of  his 
best  known  pieces.  In  The  Eternal  Goodness  are  flood :  good  ; 
hath :death;  weak:  break;  have:  prove.  In  Our  Master  are 
full :  whole  ;  look :  rebuke  ;  gratitude :  good  ;  subdued :  father- 
hood; ineffable :  hell ;  bells :  canticles  ;  holocaust :  most.  In  Bar- 
bara Frietchie  are  Lord:  horde;  staff:  scarf;  tost:  host.  In  Maud 
Muller  are  wrongs :  tongues ;  on:  alone;  poor:  door;  pain: 
again;  again:  been;  pen:  been.  In  Laus  Deo  are  Lord:  abroad; 
abroad :  God. 

Some  of  these,  certainly,  need  Professor  G.  R.  Carpenter's 
defence:  "Whittier's  rhymes  were  loose,  but  they  were  the  as- 
sonances that  the  people  loved." 

Whittier's  great  achievement  in  rhyme  is  not  the  melodious 
Dead  Ship  of  Harpswell,  or  the  refrain  of  the  Farewell  of  a 
Virginia  Slave-Mother,  or  the  beauty  of  such  lines  as 

"I  know  not  where  his  islands  lift 

Their  fronded  palms  in  air; 
I  only  know  I  cannot  drift 
Beyond  his  love  and  care,"  — 
12 


178  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

but  his  successful  restoration,  in  Snow-Bound,  of  the  iambic 
tetrameter,  here  used  not  for  rapid  narrative,  as  in  Scott,  but 
for  tender  sentiment.  Not  Goldsmith  himself,  in  his  employ- 
ment of  the  heroic  couplets  of  The  Deserted  Village,  better  turned 
his  measure  to  description  of  nature,  delineation  of  persons,  and 
that  higher  spiritual  thought  which  is  the  ultimate  mission  of 
poetry.  From  the  first  line  to  the  last  Snow-Bound  is  a  master- 
piece, and  a  masterpiece  not  spoiled  or  materially  harmed  by 
its  inclusion  of  some  of  the  rhymes  just  quoted.  It  was  much  to 
produce  octosyllabic  couplets  capable  of  presenting  such  a 
thought-picture  as  this : 

"What  matter  how  the  night  behaved? 
What  matter  how  the  north- wind  raved  ? 
Blow  high,  blow  low,  not  all  its  snow 
Could  quench  our  hearth-fire's  ruddy  glow. 
O  Time  and  Change  1  —  with  hair  as  gray 
As  was  my  sire's  that  winter  day, 
How  strange  it  seems,  with  so  much  gone 
Of  life  and  love,  to  still  live  on  1 
Ah,  brother  1  only  I  and  thou 
Are  left  of  all  that  circle  now,  — 
The  dear  home  faces  whereupon 
That  fitful  firelight  paled  and  shone. 
Henceforward,  listen  as  we  will, 
The  voices  of  that  hearth  are  still ; 
Look  where  we  may,  the  wide  earth  o'er, 
Those  lighted  faces  smile  no  more. 
We  tread  the  paths  their  feet  have  worn, 

We  sit  beneath  their  orchard-trees, 

We  hear,  like  them,  the  hum  of  bees 
And  rustle  of  the  bladed  corn; 
We  turn  the  pages  that  they  read, 

Their  written  words  we  linger  o'er, 
But  in  the  sun  they  cast  no  shade, 
No  voice  is  heard,  no  sign  is  made, 

No  step  is  on  the  conscious  floor ! 
Yet  Love  will  dream,  and  Faith  will  trust, 
(Since  He  who  knows  our  need  is  just,) 
That,  somehow,  somewhere,  meet  we  must. 
Alas  for  him  who  never  sees 
The  stars  shine  through  his  cypress-trees  I 
Who,  hopeless,  lays  his  dead  away, 
Nor  looks  to  see  the  breaking  day 
Across  the  mournful  marbles  play ! 
Who  hath  not  learned,  in  hours  of  faith, 

The  truth  to  flesh  and  sense  unknown, 


MODERN  RHYME  179 

That  Life  is  ever  lord  of  Death, 
And  Love  can  never  lose  its  own  I " 

Holmes  must  be  classed  among  the  American  singers  of  the 
second  order,  —  indeed,  his  best  work  was  in  prose.  But  none 
of  his  contemporaries  surpassed  him  in  ease  of  lyrical  flow.  The 
natural  singers  are  commonly  the  rhymers  who  depart  least  fre- 
quently from  the  orthoepical  laws  of  their  time.  Therefore  we 
find  a  rather  unusual  smoothness  and  felicity  in  the  rhymes  of 
Holmes's  best  poems.  In  The  Chambered  Nautilus  is  no  imper- 
fect or  unusual  rhyme.  In  The  Last  Leaf,  also,  is  none.  So 
accurate  is  Holmes  that  his  wan :  gone  and  said :  dead  in  this 
poem  may  hereafter  be  cited  as  proofs  of  pronunciation  in  his 
time.  Even  in  his  strictly  humorous  pieces  he  does  not  avail 
himself  of  the  jester's  usual  privilege  of  resorting  to  strained  or 
unexpected  rhymes.  In  The  Deacon's  Masterpiece  the  dialectal 
do :  yeou  ;  taown :  raoun' :  daown;  and  ellum :  sell  'em  are  accurate. 
What :  spot  are  o,  in  rural  parlance. 

With  all  of  Tennyson's  lasting  achievements  as  a  poet,  his 
principal  mark  on  the  history  of  English  rhyme  was  made  by  his 
successful  use  of  what  has  since  been  called  the  In  Memoriam 
metre,  —  the  very  phrase  being  an  indication  of  the  novelty  and 
unexpectedness  of  the  triumph.  The  form  —  iambic  tetrameter, 
rhymed  abba  —  was  not  strictly  new ;  it  occurs  in  a  way  in 
Gottfried  of  Strasburg's  Tristan,  in  the  latter  half  of  the  twelfth 
century,  where  we  have  not  only  man :  kan :  man :  kan,  but  also 
list :  ist :  ist :  list.  Chaucer  used  the  arrangement  as  the  quatrain 
ending  the  sixain  of  the  stanzas  of  his  Complaint  to  his  Lady 
(Skeat's  nomenclature).  Here,  however,  the  line  is  pentameter, 
and  the  group  of  four  lines  does  not  constitute  a  stanza.  In  one 
passage  of  Dryden's  shorter  St.  Cecilia's  Day  ode  —  the  lines 
being  of  different  lengths  —  is  flute :  discovers :  lovers :  lute.  Of 
course,  also,  the  scheme  is  that  of  each  of  the  two  quatrains 
opening  the  Italian  sonnet.  But  Tennyson's  use,  in  a  variety 
of  sober  lyrics,  was  original.  The  arrangement  would  be  un- 
suitable for  most  themes,  and  even  in  this  case  it  becomes 
heavily  monotonous  at  times  but  as  retaining  a  gravity  not 
inherent  in  more  common  forms  it  was  a  happy  thought  on 
Tennyson's  part.  Yet  should  this  abba  plan  be  applied  to  lines 


180 

having  more  than  four  stresses  it  would  annoy  or  confuse  most 
modern  readers,  who  would  feel  that  they,  and  not  the  poem, 
were  carrying  the  rhymes. 

Of  unusual  or  forced  rhymes  there  are  rather  fewer  in  Tenny- 
son than  in  his  predecessors  of  the  earlier  romantic  school,  and 
far  less  than  in  the  work  of  the  pre-Raphaelites.  We  find 
illumineth :  death  (merely  a  matter  of  slow  pronunciation) ; 
seas :  peace  ;  more :  poor  ;  curse :  horse  ;  gaze :  face  ;  wood :  flood  ; 
own :  crown  ;  tune :  moon  ;  one :  alone :  gone  ;  waist :  rest ;  stars : 
wars.  Blood :  stood  is  to  be  explained,  as  in  the  cases  cited  in  the 
previous  chapter,  by  the  necessity  of  using  an  almost  rhymeless 
word.  Christ :  mist  is  similarly  necessary ;  the  very  few  existing 
rhymes  having  small  relation  to  the  thought  of  Christ.  Thundered : 
hundred  may  have  been  natural  in  thinking  of  the  three  hundred 
in  connection  with  cannon;  but  the  pronunciation  is  one  of  the 
most  objectionable  in  modern  poetry.  Air :  sepulchre  is  hard  to 
justify  on  any  strict  theory.  Campbell,  in  Hohenlinden,  has 
rapidly:  scenery:  revelry:  artillery:  rapidly:  canopy:  chivalry: 
sepulchre;  his  pronunciation  was  perhaps  "sepulchra."  But 
Shelley  had  sepulchre:  tear.  Mahony  ("Father  Prout")  has 
ne'er:  sepulchre;  and  Andrew  Lang  (as  late  as  1871)  dear: 
sepulchre. 

Tennyson  had  small  objection  to  identical  rhymes;  thus  he 
uses  land:  land;  down:adown;  heaviness :  weariness.  Identity 
of  final  syllables,  with  changed  meaning  of  the  root  part  of  the 
word,  is  thus  brought  down  to  the  latter  half  of  the  nineteenth 
century. 

St.  Agnes'  Eve  is  perhaps  his  most  nearly  perfect  lyric,  in  its 
unity  of  inner  idea  and  rhyme-effects. 

Notwithstanding  such  successes,  from  the  hands  of  masters  of 
melody,  as  the  eight-stressed  rhymed  lines  of  The  Raven  and 
Locksley  Hall,  English  verse  cannot  safely  —  with  or  without 
rhyme  —  go  beyond  seven  stresses.  Even  the  hexameter,  when 
rhyming  in  itself  and  not  used  as  a  closing  alexandrine,  leaves  a 
poor  effect.  But  the  nine-stressed  rhymed  trochaics  of  Tennyson's 
To  Virgil  are  satisfying,  because  the  poet  divides  each  line  by  a 
strong  caesural  pause  for  the  ear  and  a  typographical  break  for 
the  eye: 


MODERN  RHYME  181 

"Roman  Virgil,  thou  that  singest 

Ilion's  lofty  temples  robed  in  fire, 
Ilion  falling,  Rome  arising, 
wars,  and  filial  faith,  and  Dido's  pyre; 

"Landscape-lover,  lord  of  language 

more  than  he  that  sang  the  'Works  and  Days,' 
All  the  chosen  coin  of  fancy 

flashing  out  from  many  a  golden  phrase; 

"Thou  that  singest  wheat  and  woodland, 

tilth  and  vineyard,  hive  and  horse  and  herd ; 
All  the  charm  of  all  the  Muses 

often  flowering  in  a  lonely  word ;  .  .  . 

"I  salute  thee,  Mantovano, 

I  that  loved  thee  since  my  day  began, 
Wielder  of  the  stateliest  measure 
ever  moulded  by  the  lips  of  man." 

Tennyson  was  fond  of  experimenting  in  various  classical 
measures,  which,  though  more  scannable  than  the  Elizabethans' 
endeavors,  and  of  course  superior  in  value  of  idea,  he  wished  to 
be  considered  merely  as  experiments. 

In  his  odes  he  allowed  himself  the  freedom  of  inserting  some 
lines  with  idea-rhyme  and  internal  rhyme. 

A  master  of  blank  verse,1  Tennyson  also  surpassed  all  his 
predecessors  in  English  in  his  unrhymed  lyrics.  On  the  whole, 
the  unrhymed  lyric  —  by  Heine,  Carducci,  Arnold,  or  whatso- 
ever nineteenth-century  lyrist,  in  this  or  that  tongue,  remains  a 
thing  far  from  indispensable.  Nothing  can  be  compared  with 
Tennyson's  Tears,  Idle  Tears  save  Lamb's  The  Old  Familiar 
Faces.  In  both  of  these  a  beautiful  and  melancholy-melodious 
refrain  virtually  constitutes  rhymed  stanzas.  In  "Now  sleeps 
the  crimson  petal,  now  the  white,"  stanzas  also  seem  to  be 
created  by  " Now  sleeps,"  "Now  lies,"  "Now  slides,"  and  "Now 
folds,"  and  by  the  ends  "thou  with  me,"  "on  to  me,"  "unto  me," 
"thoughts  in  me,"  "lost  in  me." 

Splendidly  self-explanatory,  in  thought  and  form,  is  the  auto- 
biographical Merlin  and  the  Gleam,  in  which  the  gleam  word 
recurs  as  often  and  as  effectively  as  the  thought  of  the  ideal  in  a 
man's  life. 

1  Said  Tennyson  to  William  Allingham  (Allingham's  Diary,  294) : 
"It  is  much  easier  to  write  rhyme  than  good  blank  verse." 


182  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

Matthew  Arnold,  notwithstanding  a  certain  classic  reticence  in 
his  temper  and  style,  was  by  no  means  a  close  rhymer.  He  gives 
us  Thames :  aims ;  away:  way;  well :  fill :  still ;  fire:  by  her; 
and  morning :  dawning,  which  last  the  London  Chronicle  says  is 
a  faithful  record  of  present  English  pronunciation,  but  is,  though 
used  by  Blake  and  Kipling,  "the  one  vulgar  rhyme  of  the 
language." 

In  such  balances  as 

"This  way,  this  way," 
followed  later  on  by 

f'Come  away,  come  away," 

Arnold  shows  that  an  irregularity  in  stress-matter  and  stress- 
arrangement  may  lend  new  force  to  rhyme.  Dover  Beach  is 
another  illustration  of  his  effective  use  of  this  method.  But  A 
Summer  Night,  though  rhymed,  is  not  rhythmical  prose,  —  not 
even  good  prose. 

Browning,  brave  singer  of  the  glory  of  age,  the  sureness  of 
immortality,  and  the  honor  due  to  manly  force,  was  at  times  a 
master  of  rhyme,  but  again  seemed  to  chafe  under  its  fetters. 
Nothing  more  melodious  could  be  asked  than  he  gave  us  in  the 
rhymes  of  Evelyn  Hope,  Prospice,  How  they  brought  the  Good 
News  from  Ghent  to  Aix,  or  the  sustained  Rabbi  ben  Ezra;  yet  he 
sometimes  fills  up  his  rhymes  with  "in  fine,"  "to  wit,"  "say," 
etc.,  like  a  'prentice  hand  in  poetry.  Butler  and  Byron  were  not 
freer  in  the  use  of  rhymes  of  all  sorts,  from  the  melodious  to  the 
ingenious,  and  from  the  strict  to  the  absurd.  In  his  case,  as 
elsewhere,  we  leave  unmentioned  the  ordinary,  or  so-called 
"perfect,"  rhymes,  as  taken  for  granted;  and  we  must  once 
more  remember  that  in  any  poet,  however  wayward  or  original 
in  his  rhyme-uses,  the  normal  is  largely  in  the  majority.  But  if 
we  marshal  some  of  Browning's  more  unusual  rhymes  the  result 
is  rather  surprising,  and  may  be  left  to  tell  its  own  story : 

Adela:May;  balance :  nonchalance ;  blue  eye :  dewy ;  balcony: 
falcon  eye;  companion:  any  one;  cup  more  rose:  up  morose;  can 
know:  piano;  duplicate :  supplicate ;  dizziness :  business ;  deli- 
cate:  helicate  ;  die :  mulberry ;  eye-holes :  viols ;  from  mice: 


MODERN  RHYME  183 

promise;  Jour  year-old :  Ber old ;  forethought :  worth  aught; 
fondly  there:  beyond  lie  there;  figure :  bigger ;  honour :  donour  ; 
hand :lands;  high :  properly ;  happen :  clap  pen ;  ins  and  outs: 
thin  sand  doubts;  in  hell  free:  belfry;  importune :  fortune 
(formerly  correct,  and  used  by  Gray) ;  infinite:  bright;  imperfect 
say : perfects  aye ;  laymen: amen;  London : undone ;  liberty:  I: 
why  ;  lose :  noose  ;  linger :  stringer  ;  Master  Hugues :  fugues  ; 
moments :  endowments ;  morass:  was;  news  of  her  .-Lucifer; 
office :  trophies ;  once:  suns;  once  stir :  monster ;  packed :  track ; 
pass :  was  ;  plans :  Lannes  ;  putties :  portcullis  ;  pray :  Africa  ; 
religion :  pigeon ;  right :  exquisite ;  reddens:  Edens;  small  mist: 
psalmist ;  stature :  usurpature  ;  shall  see :  palsy  ;  Solomon :  throne  ; 
singer :  finger  ;  scores :  quarter-emperors  ;  skill :  principle :  will  ; 
slip  sees :  gypsies  ;  tress :  kiss  ;  visit  I  've :  inquisitive  ;  well  swear : 
elsewhere;  within  wards :  inwards ;  went  trickle :  ventricle ; 
wreathy  hop :  Ethiop. 

In  Pacchiarotto  alone  are  Pacchiarotto :  paint-pot-0 :  lot  to : 
trot  toe :  got  to :  hot  tow;  oratory :  art-laboratory;  roomy :  gloomy : 
Beccafumi;  stubborn:  cub-born;  one  key:  monkey;  prelude: 
hell-hued;  circle :  work  ill ;  was  hard:  hazard:  mazard;  Stallo- 
reggi :  allege  ye  ;  sides  of  it :  wide  so  fit ;  Hades :  paid  ease :  ladies  ; 
pooh-poohed  it  is :  lewd  ditties :  nudities;  triumph :  cry  "Humph"  ; 
burgess :  Boanerges :  urges ;  pontiff:  won't  if;  reared  in:  mere 
din;  conventional :  mention  all ;  bolted :  dolt-head ;  half!  abet?: 
alphabet;  there1 's  X :  fair  sex ;  pott' s  hood :  falsehood ;  trumpets: 
dumb  pets;  few  venal :  Juvenal ;  Apage:cap  a-gee;  doublet: 
sub-let;  outside :  lout's  eyed;  visage :  this  age;  tractable :  fact  able; 
interpose :  purpose ;  busily :  Sicily ;  open:  no  pen;  quiet  eye: 
society;  especially :  fresh  ally;  poverty :  covert  tie;  essayed:  yes 
said;  lambdas :  damned  ass;  all!  fie:Amalfi;  clotpott :  what 
poll;  Siena's:  hyenas;  ill  able :  dissyllable ;  last  "If" :  mastiff; 
discomfiture :  dumb  fit  sure;  need  is:incedis;  constable :  one 
stable;  structure :  tucked  your;  domicile :  promise  I'll;  specimens : 
essemens;  spark  as :  carcass  ;  loathsome :  oath  some  ;  observancy: 
reserve  fancy;  abbot :  dab-pot :  scab  hot ;  transmute :  man' s  mute ; 
consequence :  non-sequence  ;  take  hold :  clay-cold  ;  dungeon :  one 
John;  existence :  hissed  hence ;  cue  be :  booby :  ruby ;  mahlstick: 
all  stick;  stomach:  some  ache;  nimbly :  chimbly ;  my  house: 


184  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

pious;  grunt  is'tf:  contrapuntist;  aubade :  so  bad ;  'scape  hence, 
ha'pence;  ranunculus:  Tommy-make-room-for-your-Uncle  us: 
homunculus;  place  in:  basin;  paddock:  ad  hoc;  convey  thought: 
enswathe  ought;  envy:  then  vie;  crystalline :  small  line;  goose- 
wont  is:  os  frontis;  chrusaora  [Greek]:  or  ray;  vexed  here:  next 
year. 

But  Browning,  says  William  Allingham  in  his  Diary,  once 
subjected  a  poem  by  him  to  a  close  analysis,  "to  see  if  any  of 
the  rhymes  were  forced,"  and  objected  to  rose :  clothes. 

As  regards  identical  rhymes,  Browning  was  willing  to  allow 
light  instead  of  might  as  the  reading  of  the  last  word  of  the  fourth 
line  of  the  first  stanza  of  Shelley's  Stanzas  written  in  Dejection 
near  Naples: 

"The  sun  is  warm,  the  sky  is  clear, 

The  waves  are  dancing  fast  and  bright, 
Blue  isles  and  snowy  mountains  wear 

The  purple  noon's  transparent  might; 

The  breath  of  the  moist  earth  is  light 
Around  its  unexpanded  buds; 

Like  many  a  voice  of  one  delight 
The  winds',  the  birds',  the  ocean-floods'  — 

The  city's  voice  itself  is  soft  like  Solitude's."  * 

The  greatest  curiosity  in  Browning's  rhymes  is  where  the  three 
momometers 

"Escape  me? 
Never, 
Beloved. 

are  separated  the  whole  length  of  the  poem  (sixteen  lines)  from 
the  corresponding 

"  I  shape  me, 
Ever 
Removed." 

1  "  Robert  Browning  wanted  me  to  read  light  for  might,  urging  that 
'  the  notion  of  light  as  a  veil  and  transparent  is  familiar  with  Shelley ' ; 
and  the  Italian  practice  of  making  words  rhyme  which  have  the  same 
sound  but  a  different  sense,  not  infrequent:  'in  this  stanza,'  he  added, 
'there  is  delight  for  light's  fellow.'  The  last  argument  seemed  to  me 
to  be  conclusive  against  light,  because  Shelley  would  almost  certainly 
not  use  the  identical  syllable  as  a  rhyming  terminal  thrice  so  close 
together."  —  H.  Buxton  Fonnan,  in  The  Athenaeum,  July  to  December, 
1907,  p.  155. 


MODERN  RHYME  185 

A  triumph  not  to  be  matched  in  English  prosody  is  the  un- 
rhymed  trochaic  pentameter  of  One  Word  More,  beginning : 

"There  they  are,  my  fifty  men  and  women 
Naming  me  the  fifty  poems  finished ; 
Take  them,  Love,  the  book  and  me  together: 
Where  the  heart  lies,  let  the  brain  lie  also." 

The  melody  of  the  movement  is  so  constant  that  it  is  difficult  to 
disabuse  one's  mind  from  the  impression  that  the  poem  is  rhymed. 

The  severest  arraignment  of  Browning's  rhymes  is  to  be  found 
in  The  True  Function  of  Criticism,  a  dialogue  by  Oscar  Wilde 
(in  The  Nineteenth  Century  for  July,  1890),  in  which  "Gilbert" 
says :  : 

"Rhyme,  that  exquisite  echo  which  in  the  music's  hollow  hill 
creates  and  answers  its  own  voice ;  rhyme,  which  in  the  hands  of 
a  real  artist  becomes  not  merely  a  material  element  of  metrical 
beauty,  but  a  spiritual  element  of  thought  and  passion  also, 
waking  a  new  mood,  it  may  be,  or  stirring  a  fresh  train  of  ideas, 
or  opening  by  mere  sweetness  and  suggestion  of  sound  some 
golden  door  at  which  the  Imagination  itself  had  knocked  in  vain ; 
rhyme,  which  can  turn  man's  utterance  and  the  speech  of  gods ; 
rhyme,  the  one  chord  we  have  added  to  the  Greek  lyre,  became 
in  Robert  Browning's  hands  a  grotesque,  misshapen  thing,  which 
made  him  at  times  masquerade  in  poetry  as  a  low  comedian,  and 
ride  Pegasus  too  often  with  his  tongue  in  his  cheek." 

Mrs.  Browning's  indifference  to  all  ordinary  rules  of  rhyme  is 
well  known.  To  make  anything  like  a  full  list  of  her  peculiar 
rhymes  would  fill  many  pages;  the  following  (arranged  alpha- 
betically to  correspond  with  the  similar  list  from  her  husband's 
poems)  may  be  given  as  representative : 

Again:  brain;  again:  men  (both  in  Bertha  in  the  Lane); 
angels :  candles  ;  alone :  home  ;  burden :  disregarding  ;  brother : 
lover;  calmly :  palm-tree ;  come:  sung;  enter :  venture ;  Eden: 
heeding  ;  faith :  breath :  death  ;  forgiven :  heaven  ;  Goethe :  duty  ; 
greatness :  incompleteness ;  gander :  wander :  chamber ;  glade  and: 
maiden;  hero' s :  tear  rose ;  hat:  bag;  idyl:  middle;  know  from: 
snow-storm;  love :  prove :  Jove ;  ladies :  babies;  mainland :  train- 
band; Modena:  God  in  a;  panther:  saunter;  playing:  away  in; 
pressure :  guesser  ;  rarest :  heiress  ;  silence :  islands  ;  satire :  na- 


186  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

ture;  suitor :  future ;  trident :  silent ;  valleys :  palace ;  ways: 
grace;  day' s :  praise ;  water:  her;  wildwood :  childhood. 

Mrs.  Browning  herself,  when  sharply  criticised  for  the  loose- 
ness of  her  rhymes,  definitely  stated  that  she  had  worked  on  a 
clear,  and  as  she  believed  correct,  theory  in  the  matter.  August 
13,  1844,  she  wrote,  with  a  Poesque  copiousness  of  italics,  to  H.  S. 
Boyd:  "Most  of  the  'incorrectnesses'  you  speak  of  may  be  'in- 
correctnesses,' but  are  not  negligences.  I  have  a  theory  about 
double  rhymes  for  which  I  shall  be  attacked  by  the  critics,  but 
which  I  could  justify  perhaps  on  high  authority,  or  at  least 
analogy.  In  fact,  these  volumes  of  mine  have  more  double 
rhymes  than  any  two  books  of  English  poems  that  ever  to  my 
knowledge  were  printed;  I  mean  of  English  poems,  not  comic. 
Now,  of  double  rhymes  in  use,  which  are  perfect  rhymes,  you 
are  aware  how  few  there  are,  and  yet  you  are  also  aware  of  what 
an  admirable  effect  in  making  a  rhythm  various  and  vigorous, 
double  rhyming  is  in  English  poetry.  Therefore  I  have  used  a 
certain  licence;  and  after  much  thoughtful  study  of  the  Eliza- 
bethan writers,  have  ventured  it  with  the  public.  And  do  you 
tell  me,  you  who  object  to  the  use  of  a  different  vowel  in  a  double 
rhyme,  why  you  rhyme  (as  everybody  does,  without  blame  from 
anybody)  'given '  to  'heaven/  when  you  object  to  my  rhyming 
'remember'  and  'chamber'?  The  analogy  surely  is  all  on  my 
side,  and  I  believe  that  the  spirit  of  the  English  language  is  also. 
...  I  wish  you  to  consider  the  subject  as  a  point  for  consideration 
seriously,  and  not  to  blame  me  as  a  writer  of  careless  verses.  If 
I  deal  too  much  in  licences,  it  is  not  because  I  am  idle,  but 
because  I  am  speculative  for  freedom's  sake." 

Frederic  G.  Kenyon,  the  editor  of  Mrs.  Browning's  letters,  in 
discussing  this  argument,  says  that  the  experiment  is  "as  legiti- 
mate as,  say,  the  metrical  experiments  in  hexameters  and  hen- 
decasyllabics  of  Longfellow  or  Tennyson,  and  whether  approved 
or  not  it  should  be  criticised  as  an  experiment,  not  as  mere  care- 
lessness. .  .  .  That  Mrs.  Browning's  ear  was  quite  capable  of 
discerning  true  rhymes  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  she  tacitly 
abandoned  her  experiment  in  assonances.  Not  only  in  the  pure 
and  high  art  of  the  Sonnets  from  the  Portuguese,  but  even  in 
Casa  Guidi  Windows,  the  rhetorical  and  sometimes  colloquial 


MODERN  RHYME  187 

tone  of  which  might  have  been  thought  to  lend  itself  to  such 
devices,  imperfect  rhymes  come  but  rarely."  1 

In  Lady  Geraldine's  Courtship  Mrs.  Browning  made  a  novel 
use  of  internal  rhyme,  —  a  use  interesting  in  itself  and  impor- 
tant in  its  effect  on  the  form  of  Poe's  Raven.  The  "noblest  of 
her  sex  "  (dedication  to  Poe's  collected  poems  of  1845)  is  in- 
separably connected  with  the  best  known  of  his  writings. 

There  is  significance  in  the  title  of  the  late  W.  E.  Henley's 
collection  of  English  Lyrics:  Chaucer  to  Poe.  "After  Keats," 
says  Mr.  Henley  in  his  introduction,  "there  is  no  fresh  note,  until 
we  hear  from  over  the  Atlantic  the  artful,  subtle,  irresistible  song 
of  Poe:  the  New  Music  which  none  who  has  heard  it  can  for- 
get, and  which,  if  you  listen  for  it,  you  will  catch  in  much  of  the 
melody  that  has  found  utterance  since  Mr.  Swinburne,  working 
after  Baudelaire,  shocked  and  enchanted  the  world  with  his 
First  Series  of  Poems  and  Ballads." 

On  what  did  that  music  depend? 

It  is  atmosphere,  not  rhyme-freedom  or  other  external  thing, 
that  marks  originality  in  a  poet.  We  may  find  anticipations  of 
Poe  even  as  far  back  as  Dryden's 

"Less  than  a  god  they  thought  there  could  not  dwell 
Within  the  hollow  of  that  shell 
That  spoke  so  sweetly  and  so  well. 
What  passion  cannot  music  raise  and  quell?" 

but  finally  the  lordship  of  verse,  like  the  kingdom  of  God,  is 
within  and  not  without.  Poe's  genius  is  a  far  more  important 
thing  than  any  or  all  of  his  mannerisms;  but  as  he  was  a  life- 
long student  of  technique  some  of  his  methods  specially  repay 
investigation. 

His  use  of  the  "repetend"  —  the  parallel  repetition  of  ex- 
panded or  contrasted  ideas,  with  or  without  change  of  the  rhyme- 
word  —  may  fairly  be  called  his  most  characteristic  addition  to 
poetic  form.  He  did  not  invent  it ;  but  no  other  poet,  before  him 
or  after  him,  employed  it  so  effectively.  Henceforth  the  device  is 
his  own.  Akin  to  Hebrew  parallelism  and  the  refrain,  it  carries 
us  back  to  the  beginnings  of  poetry ;  but  in  its  virtually  original 

1  ['Letters  of  Elizabeth  Barrett  Browning  " ;  1, 182-4. 


188  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

manner  of  use  Poe  availed  himself  of  a  marvellously  musical 


ear.* 

Word-counting,  of  which  so  wearisome  a  burden  is  laid  upon 
scholarship  in  these  thesis-manufacturing  days,  has  added  little 
to  philology  and  nothing  to  literature;  but  I  am  tempted  to 
indulge  in  it  for  once,  in  order  to  see  if  it  may  give  any  aid  in 
the  study  of  Poe's  method. 

There  are  in  his  small  book  of  verse  —  omitting  the  unfinished 
blank- verse  drama  of  Politian,  which  contains  no  songs  —  2121 
rhymes,  including  identical  line-endings  in  the  repetends.  In  the 
2121,  1842,  or  86  per  cent,  are  perfect  sound-correspondences, 
according  to  present  English  pronunciation,  leaving  279  imper- 
fect, strained,  or  unusual.  But  of  these  279,  169  are  allowable 
or  in  common  poetical  use  —  that  is,  such  rhymes  as  sea :  melody  ; 
I  ."melody  (y,  as  we  have  noted,  has  been  both  ai  and  I  since 
Shakespeare's  day);  river:  ever;  love:  strove;  wood:  flood; 
given:  heaven;  spirit:  inherit;  none:  gone;  tresses:  kisses;  birth: 
forth;  wars:  stars;  woman :  human ;  breath :  beneath ;  ponder: 
wonder;  pain:  again  (Poe,  like  many  poets,  is  obliged  to  sound 
again  in  both  ways  in  the  same  poem).  Some  of  these  are  made 
necessary,  as  so  often,  by  the  fewness  of  rhymes  for  important 
words;  some  are  the  results  of  the  slow  utterance  essential  to 
the  music  of  the  verse.  Occasionally,  but  more  rarely  than  his 
pre-Raphaelite  admirers,  Poe  employs  an  unusual  accent  in  an 
otherwise  perfect  rhyme,  as  tree-top : drop ;  hence: reverence. 

Omitting  all  these  allowable  rhymes,  169  in  all,  we  have  re- 
maining only  110  that  can  be  called  in  any  sense  unusual;  that 
is,  Poe  employs  but  five  per  cent  of  forced  and  out-of-the-way 
rhymes.  Of  these  latter,  the  ones  deserving  citation  on  the  basis 
employed  in  our  similar  lists  from  other  poets  are  as  follows : 

That  is:  lattice:  thereat  is;  lent  thee:  sent  thee :  nepenthe ;   re- 

1  Quoting  from  F.  B.  Gummere's  Handbook  of  Poetics,  153,  the  re- 
mark that  what  is  called  perfect  rhyme  [identity]  "is  now  entirely 
foreign  to  English  verse,"  C.  Alphonso  Smith,  in  his  Repetition  and 
Parallelism  in  English  Verse,  148,  adds  that  "Poe  skillfully  disguises 
the  effect  of  his  perfect  rhymes  by  lessening  the  emphasis  of  the  re- 
peated rhyme-word.  This  he  does  by  throwing  a  sudden  and  superior 
emphasis  on  the  newly  introduced  word  or  words  that  serve  to  differen- 
tiate the  two  forms  of  the  repetend." 


MODERN  RHYME  189 

assure  me :  o'er  me :  bore  me :  d'Elormie  (proper  name  invented 
for  the  sake  of  the  rhyme) ;  June:  moon;  valleys:  palace;  musi- 
cally:  valley  ;  swamp :  encamp ;  been  (Poe's  regular  pronuncia- 
tion) :  serene  ;  holy :  melancholy  ;  bliss :  is  ;  suit :  lute :  mute  ; 
intrude:  solitude:  food:  imbued;  solitude:  stood;  wan:  man; 
Dian:  dry  on:  lion;  kissed  her :  vista :  sister  ;  Leda:  reader; 
Ferdinando  :  can  do;  arrant  :  transparent;  fancies  :  pansies; 
many :Annie;  early : dearly ;  upon:  known;  rode:  God;  was: 
pass;  years:  cares;  tent :  extravagant ;  shade  and :  maiden ;  glade 
and:  maiden  (used  by  Mrs.  Browning). 

After  all,  this  is  a  very  modest  list,  compared  with  those 
gathered  from  the  Brownings  and  Emerson.  Kissed  her :  vista : 
sister  and  Leda :  reader  are  rather  Cockneyish  in  appearance,  but 
represent  a  common  sound,  as  do  arrant :  transparent.  Tent : 
extravagant  is  unexpected,  but  occurred  in  a  juvenile  poem. 

The  gems  of  the  collection,  however,  are  the  two  last,  of  which 
the  young  Poe  wrote : 

"The  rhyme  .  .  .  has  the  appearance  of  affectation.  It  is, 
however,  imitated  from  Sir  Walter  Scott,  or  rather  from  Claud 
Halcro,  in  whose  mouth  I  admired  its  effect: 

'Oh  were  there  an  island 

Tho'  ever  so  wild 
Where  woman  might  smile,  and 

No  man  be  beguil'd, '  etc." 

Shadow :  Eldorado,  the  germ  of  Poe's  last  poem,  appears  in 
the  early  Dreamland. 

A  curious  early  rhyme  is  paroquet :  say.  Frankly  'prentice- 
work  (perhaps  meant  to  be  altered)  is,  in  Fairy  Land, 

"Like  —  almost  anything  — 
Or  a  yellow  albatross." 

rhyming  with  covering  and  toss. 

Internal  rhymes,  of  which  Poe  was  fond,  are  usually  but  not 
always  introduced  at  regular  intervals. 

Alliteration  is  of  course  often  employed,  but  seldom  as  in  "the 
pallid  bust  of  Pallas." 

The  assonance  or  internal  rhyme  of  Peccavimus :  but  rave  not 
thus  (Lenore}  is  unmatched  elsewhere;  the  modern  reader  must 


190  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

remember  that  the  English  pronunciation  of  Latin  was  in  vogue 
in  America  in  Poe's  day. 

Poe  does  not  avoid  assonance  in  consecutive  lines  ending,  for 
instance,  pride :  guise :  beside :  eyes;  or  even  see :  sky :  droopingly : 
eye;  whether  he  did  not  notice  it,  or  considered  it  a  merit,  is  hard 
to  tell.  In  the  next-to-the-last  division  of  Tamerlane  the  con- 
secutive endings  are-  more :  so :  door :  low :  stone :  known :  show : 
below :  woe.  Nor  does  he  object  to  given :  alone :  heaven :  tone : 
striven :  throne :  down :  crown,  where  the  stanza-scheme  is 
abababcc. 

The  following  poems  are  in  blank  verse:  The  Coliseum,  To 
Helen  (the  longer  poem  of  that  title),  To  M.  L.  S.,  and  To  — 

;  total  lines,  157.    In  them  the  feminine  ending  is  unusually 

frequent.    In  To  Helen  it  abounds,  and  in  To  M.  L.  S.  eight 

lines  out  of  eighteen  are  feminine.    In  To the  second 

line  has  six  feet.  Richard  Henry  Stoddard  once  remarked  that 
to  the  end  of  his  life  Poe  remained  a  mere  tyro  in  blank  verse; 
certainly  these  four  pieces  are  not  indispensable.  The  worth- 
lessness  of  this  To  Helen  is  in  startling  contrast  with  the  beauty 
of  the  lyric  of  the  same  name. 

Similarly  poor  are  the  sonnets,  of  which  Silence  has  fifteen 
lines,  rhymed  ababcddccefefgg.  Poe  was  master  of  peculiar  verse- 
forms  of  the  kinds  associated  with  his  name,  but  more  feebly 
used  the  orthodox  measures. 

Of  rhymeless  lines  in  rhymed  poems,  aside  from  identities, 
there  are  only  eighteen;  two  in  Eldorado;  twelve  in  Annabel 
Lee;  and  four  in  Evening  Star,  which  turns  into  rhyme  after 
the  start. 

Of  lines  with  identical  endings,  owing  to  Poe's  use  of  the 
repetend,  there  are  no  less  than  63  in  Ulalume,  54  in  The  Raven, 
36  in  The  Bells,  and  34  in  For  Annie;  18  others  make  a  total 
of  205.  Of  all  Poe's  poems  Ulalume  is  the  most  characteristic, 
both  of  his  genius  and  of  his  method  of  expression.  The  follow- 
ing from  Ulalume  — 

"And  I  said  —  'She  is  warmer  than  Dian: 
She  rolls  through  an  ether  of  sighs, 
She  revels  in  a  region  of  sighs : 
She  has  seen  that  the  tears  are  not  dry  on 


MODERN  RHYME  191 

These  cheeks  where  the  worm  never  dies, 
And  has  come  past  the  stars  of  the  Lion 

To  point  us  the  path  to  the  skies, 

To  the  Lethean  peace  of  the  skies : 
Come  up,  in  despite  of  the  Lion, 

To  shine  on  us  with  her  bright  eyes: 
Come  up  through  the  lair  of  the  Lion, 

With  love  in  her  luminous  eyes' —  " 

suggests  Swinburne  in  two  or  three  places,  though  not  as  strongly 
as  the  Byron  stanzas  quoted  on  page  166. 

The  repetend  appears  in  all  but  one  stanza  (the  second)  of 
The  Raven,  Poe  prided  himself  on  The  Raven  stanza,  as  con- 
taining "some  altogether  novel  effects,  arising  from  an  exten- 
sion of  the  application  of  the  principles  of  rhyme  and  allitera- 
tion." Whether  his  account  of  its  evolution,  in  The  Philosophy 
of  Composition,  be  considered  forethought  or  afterthought,  it  is 
an  interesting  study  of  a  poem  by  its  maker.  Another  study  of 
The  Raven  may  be  made  by  any  reader  who  will  compare  it 
with  Locksley  Hall,  and  note  how  different  an  effect  is  given  to 
Poe's  lines,  though  in  Tennyson's  metre,  by  the  internal  rhyme, 
the  repetend,  and  the  feminine  ending. 

"While,  to  listen,  the  red  levin 
(With  the  rapid  Pleiads,  even. 
Which  were  seven) 
Pauses  in  heaven," 

in  Israfel,  seems  to  have  been  influential  upon  Rossetti's  The 
Blessed  Damozel,  the  first  stanza  of  which,  in  the  original  form, 
was 

"The  blessed  Damozel  leaned  out 
From  the  gold  bar  of  heaven : 
Her  blue  deep  eyes  were  deeper  much 

Than  a  deep  water,  even. 
She  had  three  lilies  in  her  hand, 
And  the  stars  in  her  hair  were  seven." 

The  most  noticeable  mark  of  the  rhymes  of  the  "pre- 
Raphaelite  "  school  in  the  English  verse  of  the  second  half  of 
the  nineteenth  century  —  I  use  the  term  broadly,  as  including 
not  only  Rossetti  and  Morris  but  also  Swinburne  —  is  the  forcing 
of  rhymes  falling  on  final  syllables,  as  in  Rossetti's  well:  audible: 


192 

tell:  Jell,  and  so  on  in  many  cases.  This  mannerism  is  clearly 
due  to  two  things:  pleasure  in  a  lingering  pronunciation  that 
gives  the  fullest  sound-values;  and  a  thorough  enjoyment  of 
ballad  and  other  archaic  models.  Thus  Rossetti  rhymed  me: 
Nineveh;  unaccountable :  shell :  well ;  hers:  wing-feathers;  in- 
deed :  opened :  fire-footed.  The  pre-Raphaelite  wan  water  was 
sure  to  reflect  her.  Elsewhere  Rossetti  did  not  fear  to  join  win  : 
him  ;  veterans :  France  ;  strong :  flung  ;  years :  stirs  ;  calm  : 
warm. 

Of  the  rhymes  in  the  first  version  of  The  Blessed  Damozel  — 
which,  it  will  be  remembered,  was  written  when  the  young 
Rossetti  was  strongly  influenced  by  Poe's  Raven,  and  was  de- 
signed to  be  a  counterpart  to  that  poem  —  forty-two  are  perfect. 
For  the  rest,  we  have  heaven :  even :  seven ;  adorn :  worn :  corn  ; 
choristers  :  hers  :  years;  on  :  begun  :  sun;  calm  :  warm  :  arm; 
fierce :  pierce :  spheres  ;  said :  prayed :  afraid  ;  untrod :  God :  period  ; 
tree :  be :  audibly  ;  me :  be :  verily  ;  spheres :  barriers :  tears. 

The  Blessed  Damozel  was  published  in  The  Germ  in  1850. 
Then  came  The  Defence  of  Guenevere,  and  Other  Poems,  by 
William  Morris  (1858).  This  was  pre-Raphaelite  through  and 
through;  beginning  with  the  unaccustomed  spelling  of  Guene- 
vere, it  was  consistently  unlike  the  prevalent  English  poetry  of 
the  time,  in  titles,  antique  words,  ultra-Keats-like  rhymes,  and 
mediaeval  spirit.  Tennyson  had  prepared  the  immediate  way, 
to  some  extent;  and  Browning,  for  reasons  which  I  have  never 
been  quite  able  to  fathom,  was  high  in  the  favor  of  the  new  group ; 
but,  after  all,  its  members  had  a  tone  of  their  own,  which  sur- 
vived only  in  Swinburne,  and  died  with  him. 

Morris's  first  book  was  received  with  inextinguishable  laughter 
by  the  very  journal  (The  Athenceum)  which  afterwards  became, 
in  the  reviews  written  by  Theodore  Watts-Dunton,  the  principal 
Swinburnian  exponent.  But  there  was  more  than  affectation  in 
Rapunzel,  The  Blue  Closet,  Shameful  Death,  and  some  of  the  rest, 
queer  as  they  were.  Affectation,  indeed,  —  if  chargeable  against 
others  of  the  group,  or  its  lesser  copyists,  —  belonged  to  Morris 
in  no  more  than  a  limited  sense ;  he  was  as  sincere  in  his  literary 
archaisms  as  in  his  later  work  as  designer,  decorator,  printer, 
and  socialist.  As  Burne-Jones  said  of  himself,  Morris  belonged 


MODERN  RHYME  193 

to  the  fourteenth  century.  A  man  has  a  right  to  believe  that 
tl  ere  was  good  and  beauty  in  medievalism,  if  he  seeks  to  trans- 
f  r  that  good  and  beauty  to  his  own  times,  for  the  benefit  of  his 
fellows. 

The  general  character  of  Morris's  rhymes  did  not  differ  mate- 
rially from  that  of  the  rhymes  of  Rossetti  and  Swinburne.  The 
proportion  of  unusual  sound-concurrences  is  perhaps  somewhat 
smaller  in  him  than  in  his  associates;  yet  in  The  Defence  of 
Guenevere  volume  we  find  sword :  word :  cord ;  sword :  sward ; 
lord :  sword  ;  alone :  son  ;  on :  son  ;  fear :  where  ;  plaits :  bats  ; 
tower:  lower  (adverb);  floods :  woods ;  promises :  ease ;  said: 
maid;  hand :  bend :  send ;  year :  out-wear ;  bliss:  is;  though: 
through  ;  have :  brave  ;  also :  know  ;  preux :  shew :  new  ;  again  : 
pain:  fain;  again :  then :  ten  (same  poem);  brow:  blow;  you: 
do :  so  ;  hands :  commands :  wands  ;  fingers :  lingers :  singers. 

In  one  respect  Morris  surpassed  all  other  nineteenth-century 
poets.  Not  since  Chaucer  had  English  literature  possessed  so 
long  a  narrative  poem  as  The  Earthly  Paradise.  It  lacks  the 
breezy  good  cheer  of  The  Canterbury  Tales,  for  this  "idle  singer 
of  an  empty  day  "  was  touched  with  a  gentle  melancholy.  But 
there  is  a  fascination  in  it  which  begins  with  its  beautiful  title  and 
ends  with  its  last  page  —  a  fascination  partly  due,  like  that  of 
Spenser's  Faerie  Queene,  to  its  abstraction  from  the  thoughts 
and  words  of  to-day.  After  all,  the  true  province  of  rhyme  is  to 
charm  the  reader;  and  The  Earthly  Paradise  would  have  been 
impossible  without  the  binding  and  unifying  power  of  rhyme. 
It  is  the  rhyme,  more  than  the  metre,  which  furnishes  the  reg- 
ularly recurrent  music  of  these  twenty-four  tales.  Narrative 
charm  may  inhere  in  stories  told  in  blank  verse,  as  witness  the 
Idyls  of  tlie  King;  but  there  is  a  softer  grace  in  Spenser's  and 
Morris's  melody,  which  depends  upon  the  variety-in-unity  given 
by  rhyme  to  stanza  or  couplet. 

For  Morris's  rhyme-use  in  this  his  masterpiece,  we  may  turn 
to  a  page  of  The  Land  East  of  the  Sun  and  West  of  the  Moon,  as 
giving  us  a  fair  average.  Here,  to  begin  with,  are  moon :  boon  and 
moon :  tune  —  variation  enough  to  equip  a  theorist  concerning 
Chaucerian  or  Shakespearean  pronunciation.  For  the  rest,  we 
find  was:  pass;  around:  round;  enow  (inau) :  show;  love:  move; 

13 


194  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

guest-chamber :  hear  ;    bear :  hear ;    memory :  by  ;    stared :  heard  ; 
why:  history ;  place:  ways. 

No  poet  since  Poe  has  evoked  a  greater  number  of  new  melo- 
dies from  the  old  English  lyre  than  Algernon  Charles  Swinburne. 

In  general,  with  all  his  apparently  inexhaustible  fertility  as  a 
rhymer,  Swinburne  is  not  abnormal  or  eccentric  in  his  choice 
of  correlated  sounds.  No  such  miscellany  of  rough  assonances 
of  every  kind  as  we  have  just  culled  from  the  Brownings  could  be 
drawn  from  the  collected  edition  of  his  works.  Some  of  the 
pre-Raphaelite  rhymes  mentioned  under  Rossetti's  name  may 
be  found  in  Swinburne;  but  in  general,  he  relies  upon  familiar 
methods.  The  novelty  of  his  verse  depends  upon  the  arrange- 
ment of  metre  and  rhyme,  and  upon  an  almost  inexhaustible 
vocabulary. 

Of  rhymes  which  we  may  call  earmarks  of  the  pre-Raphaelites 
we  find  fell:  insatiable;  grass:  was;  her:  harp-player;  well-water: 
her;  hair:  lovelier.  Rossetti  might  also  have  used  brows:  house: 
poisonous.  Quiet:  riot  and  hers:  worse  are  Mrs.-Browningesque. 
Other  somewhat  forced  or  unusual  rhymes  are  place:  ways; 
spume :  loom  ;  men :  rain  ;  kiss :  is  ;  whit :  sweet ;  green :  sin  ; 
cheer:  her;  sit:  feet;  them:  flame;  men :  again :  rain  (in  which 
again  occupies  its  usual  compromise  position  with  more  than 
usual  nicety  of  non-committal);  pressure : pleasure.  In  a  few 
instances  he  uses  identical  rhymes;  such  as  sea:  see;  is:  is; 
be :  be.  The  assonance  God :  blood  is  frequent  in  other  poets ; 
month :  doth  is  unusual  anywhere,  and  seems  like  a  slip. 

But  it  is  in  his  larger  methods  that  Swinburne's  originality 
is  chiefly  to  be  found.  In  Faustine  are  the  following  mono- 
rhymes  with  the  title  word  in  order :  lean  (verb) :  clean :  queen : 
sheen:  therein:  between:  ween:  thin:  kin:  wean:  screen:  mien: 
Magdalene :  mean  (verb) :  seen :  skin :  win :  lean  (adjective) :  scene : 
in :  din :  sin :  teen :  begin :  spin :  glean :  green :  fin :  serene :  Mity- 
lene :  gin :  unclean :  epicene :  obscene :  mean  (adjective) :  love- 
machine  :  Lampsacene :  been :  wherein :  chin :  keen.  This  reminds 
one  of  the  Provenfal  methods  of  accumulation. 

The  Armada  consists  of  eight-stressed  lines,  trochaic  and  dac- 
tylic, with  an  accented  syllable  at  the  end,  and  rhymes  not  only 
at  the  close  but  at  the  third  and  eighth  syllables  of  the  line: 


MODERN  RHYME  195 

"England,  none  that  is  born  thy  son,  and  lives,  by  grace  of  thy  glory, 

free, 
Lives  and  yearns  not  at  heart  and  burns  with  hope  to  serve  as  he 

worships  thee; 
None  may  sing  thee :  the  sea- wind's  whig  beats  down  our  songs  as  it 

hails  the  sea." 


In  the  Choriambics  of  the  second  series  of  Poems  and  Ballads 
the  choriambics  themselves  are  preceded  by  a  trochee  at  the 
beginning  of  each  line,  and  are  followed  by  a  rhyming  iambus : 

"Love,  what  ailed  thee  to  leave  life  that  was  made  lovely,  we  thought, 

with  love? 

What  sweet  visions  of  sleep  lured  thee  away,  down  from  the  light 
above?" 

Here  the  metre  is  perfectly  obvious  when  looked  at,  but  would 
not  occur  to  the  ordinary  reader  without  the  help  of  the  title. 

In  Swinburne's  A  Century  of  Roundels  the  fetters  of  the  roundel, 
even  when  he  stretches  them  by  the  use  of  his  ababbababab  system, 
and  the  use  of  feet  of  varying  numbers  and  lengths,  do  not  show 
his  remarkable  powers  as  well  as  the  freer  measures.  In  some 
of  these  roundels  he  makes  the  refrain  a  single  word  or  even 
syllable;  as  in  Sleep,  the  first  seven  lines  of  which  are  as  hard 
to  reduce  to  grammatical  order  as  Browning's  Sordello.  When 
rhyme-devices  become  too  intricate  they  are  verbal  puzzles  rather 
than  aids  to  either  pleasure  or  memory;  the  scheme  entangles 
the  poet. 

In  Hesperia  are  six  stresses  with  rhyme;  a  measure  usually 
unsuccessful  in  English,  because  of  the  monotony  of  our  strongly 
marked  caesura,  virtually  breaking  the  line  into  two  short  and 
rather  jerky  halves.  But  it  is  not  necessary  to  catalogue  Swin- 
burne's stanza-forms  and  scansion-systems. 

Two  things  are  the  chief  characteristics  of  Swinburne's  verse 
and  give  it  a  distinction  of  its  own.  One  is  his  intricate  and  ap- 
parently indefinite  use  of  "alliteration's  artful  aid,"  which,  with 
him,  rises  from  the  place  of  an  old-fashioned  metrical  trick  into 
that  of  unforgetable  music.  Alliteration  cannot  be  banished,  as 
some  would  banish  it,  while  the  works  of  its  chief  masters  in  the 
nineteenth  century  —  Poe  and  Swinburne  —  remain  on  the 


196  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

heights.    In  them  our  first  English  rhyme  has  once  more  come 
to  its  own,  though  in  a  different  way.1 

Swinburne's  other  chief  characteristic  is  his  use  of  the  iambic- 
anapsestic  line,  of  three  or  four  stresses,  usually  in  an  eight- 
line  stanza,  with  feminine  rhymes  at  the  ends  of  lines  1,  3,  5,  and 
7.  The  externally  beautiful,  if  morally  objectionable,  Dolores 
of  the  first  series  of  Poems  and  Ballads  is  in  this  form,  as  well 
as  the  Dedication  (to  Edward  Burne-Jones)  of  the  same  famous 
volume.  So  (with  the  exception  of  the  last  line)  is  the  lyric  in 
the  second  series,  which  may  be  taken,  on  the  whole,  as  the 
best  single  illustration  of  Swinburne's  method  and  success: 
A  Forsaken  Garden,  In  it  the  final  line  is  more  than  once  a 
clear  revival,  in  English,  of  the  classical  foot  the  molossus.  The 
form  of  the  poem  was  not,  of  course,  Swinburne's  invention; 
we  have  found  it  in  Byron  (see  page  166).  But  henceforth  it 
belongs  to  Swinburne,  by  right  of  eminent  domain.  One  ignor- 
ant of  English  might  take  pleasure  in  listening  to  the  melody 
of  the  pathetically  melodious  lines.  Nor  is  it  easy  to  find  in 
any  language  since  the  Greek  a  truer  combination  of  majesty 
and  music  than  in  the  closing  stanza: 

"Till  the  slow  sea  rise  and  the  sheer  cliff  crumble, 
Till  terrace  and  meadow  the  deep  gulfs  drink, 
Till  the  strength  of  the  waves  of  the  high  tides  humble 

The  fields  that  lessen,  the  rocks  that  shrink, 
Here  now  in  his  triumph  where  all  things  falter, 

Stretched  out  on  the  spoils  that  his  own  hand  spread, 
As  a  god  self-slain  on  his  own  strange  altar, 
Death  lies  dead." 

Novalis  once  said  that  "poems  which  sound  melodiously  and 
are  full  of  beautiful  words,  but  without  any  sense  or  connection" 
are  the  height  of  art.  This  remark  is  refuted  by  the  whole  history 
of  literature,  from  Job  to  Wordsworth.  Much,  perhaps  most, 
of  Swinburne's  work  must  be  thrown  aside  as  lacking  that  which 
makes  "baggage  for  eternity."  But  certainly  he  left  English 
verse  richer  than  he  found  it. 

There  is  a  proper  place,  between  rhyme  and  blank  verse,  for 

1  "Another  of  Swinburne's  feats  of  metrical  invention  was  the  dis- 
covery that  alliteration  was  the  true  basis  of  English  poetry."  — 
JAMES  DOUGLAS:  The  Athenaeum,  Apr.  17,  1909. 


MODERN  RHYME  197 

anything  that  makes  a  pleasing  effect  or  suits  the  thought.  A 
certain  advantage  lies  in  the  variant,  —  even  in  the  discord,  if 
the  golden  mean  between  rule  and  license  be  observed.  There- 
fore there  is  a  legitimate,  and  indeed  an  indispensable,  use  in 
the  higher  literature  for  the  noble  semi-rhythmical  prose  of  the 
Authorized  Version  of  the  Bible,  and  for  the  balance  and  swing 
into  which  we  naturally  fall  in  prayer,  in  eulogy,  in  fervid  politi- 
cal oratory,  and  in  picturesque  description.1  This  is  the  element 
which  gives  pleasureableness  to  Milton's  Areopagitica,  to  Sir 
Thomas  Browne's  Religio  Medici,  and  to  Carlyle's  Everlasting 
Yea  chapter  in  Sartor  Resartus.  The  difference  between  them  — 
and  a  hundred  other  noble  passages  of  English  prose  —  and  the 
best  part  of  Macpherson's  Ossian  or  Walt  Whitman's  Leaves  of 
Grass  is  one  of  attainment  rather  than  form.  Macpherson  won 
a  wide  though  temporary  fame  because  of  the  majesty  of  some 
of  his  thoughts  and  the  unusual  manner  of  their  expression; 
he  failed  to  retain  that  renown  because  readers  discovered  that 
grammatical  inversion  is  not  necessarily  poetic  eloquence. 
Whitman  really  invented  nothing  in  his  poetic  form ;  he  used  a 
vehicle  as  old  as  impassioned  or  imaginative  prose.  Sometimes 
he  employed  it  well,  sometimes  ill;  he  was  at  his  best  when 
nearest  to  a  real  but  free  balance  between  idea  and  idea ;  he  was 
at  his  worst  when  he  merely  threw  lists  of  words  at  his  readers, 
expecting  them  to  find  poetry  in  a  jumbled  page  of  the  dictionary 
or  the  geographical  index. 

Instead  of  adding  another  to  the  existing  analyses  of  Whit- 
man's measures,  let  us  turn  to  his  own  statement  of  his  metrical 
purpose.  For  this  we  are  indebted  to  Professor  Bliss  Perry's 
life  of  the  poet,  in  which  is  recovered  a  "notice,"  written  by 
himself,  of  his  Dartmouth  poem  of  1872.  This  statement  was 
designed  —  unsuccessfully  as  it  proved  —  for  editorial  use  in 
a  Washington  paper.  If  we  dismiss  from  our  minds  its  amaz- 
ing egotism  we  shall  find  it  a  really  important  utterance  of  the 
aim  and  method  of  one  of  the  most  considerable  poets  of  the 
nineteenth  century: 

1  Sometimes,  in  the  sweep  of  strong  feeling,  rhyme  itself  unconsciously 
enters,  as  in  Lincoln's  "Fondly  do  we  hope,  fervently  do  we  pray,  that 
this  mighty  scourge  of  war  may  speedily  pass  away  "  (Second  Inaugural). 


198  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

"Walt  Whitman's  form  of  composition  is  not  attractive  at 
first  sight  to  accustomed  readers  of  verse.  He  discharges  him- 
self quite  altogether  from  the  old  laws  of  'poetry,'  considering 
them  and  their  results  unfit  for  present  needs,  and  especially 
unfit  for  the  United  States ;  and  claims  to  inaugurate  an  original 
modern  style,  to  be  followed  and  expanded  by  future  writers. 
His  theory  is  that  our  times  exhibit  the  advent  of  two  especially 
new  creative  worlds,  or  influences,  giving  a  radically  changed 
form  to  Civilization,  namely,  the  world  of  science  for  one,  and 
the  world  of  democratic  republicanism  for  another;  and  that 
a  third  influence,  a  new  poetic  world  of  character  and  form,  ad- 
justed to  the  new  spirit  and  facts  and  consistent  with  democracy 
and  science,  is  indispensable.  He  says  the  United  States  must 
found  their  own  imaginative  literature  and  poetry,  and  that 
nothing  merely  copied  from  and  following  out  the  feudal  world 
will  do.  His  aim  is  therefore  a  profound  one  and  essentially 
revolutionary.  He  dismisses  without  ceremony  all  the  orthodox 
accoutrements,  tropes,  verbal  haberdashery,  'feet,'  and  the 
entire  stock  in  trade  of  rhyme-talking  heroes  and  heroines  and 
all  the  love-sick  plots  of  customary  poetry,  and  constructs  his 
verse  in  a  loose  and  free  metre  of  his  own,  of  an  irregular  length 
of  lines,  apparently  lawless  at  first  perusal,  although  on  closer 
examination  a  certain  regularity  appears,  like  the  recurrence  of 
lesser  and  larger  waves  on  the  sea-shore,  rolling  in  without  inter- 
mission, and  fitfully  rising  and  falling. 

"In  this  free  metre,  and  in  verses  —  when  you  get  the  hang 
of  them  —  singularly  exhilarating,  and  that  affect  one  like  an 
atmosphere  unusually  charged  with  oxygen,  he,  by  a  perpetual 
series  of  what  might  be  called  ejaculations,  manages  to  express 
himself  on  about  every  theme  interesting  to  humanity,  or  known 
to  the  body,  passions,  experiences,  emotions  of  man  or  woman, 
or  sought  by  the  intellect  and  soul." 

It  has  sometimes  been  said  that  the  noblest  poetry  is  that  which 
is  most  unstudied.  It  is  true  that  sophisticated  and  over-artistic 
verse  is  not  the  best;  but  neither  is  that  which  is  most  nearly 
destitute  of  art.  As  well  say  that  an  idea  is  a  cathedral  and  an 
outcry  an  oration.  In  fact,  Whitman's  apparently  careless  verse 
was  carefully  elaborated  on  a  definite  plan,  and  was  at  its  best 


MODERN  RHYME  199 

when  most  elaborated.  One  has  only  to  examine  a  page  of  Mr. 
McKay's  variorum  edition  of  Leaves  of  Grass  to  see  how  clearly 
Whitman's  scheme  lay  in  his  mind ;  and  how  closely  he  followed 
it,  in  revisions  more  careful  than  many  other  poets  have  given 
to  their  scansion  and  rhyme.  The  lilt  of  his  verse  is  unmistak- 
able. A  definite  thought  is  taken,  and  clearly  uttered  at  the 
start.  Then,  in  its  elaboration,  point  after  point  is  cumulatively 
added,  antithesis  being  treated  as  subordinate  to  the  rise  of  the 
effect.  In  this  particular,  Leaves  of  Grass  differs  from  Hebrew 
parallelism,  in  which  statement  is  splendidly  set  over  against 
statement,  and  catalogues,  if  introduced,  are  usually  put  into 
a  sort  of  refrain  form.  In  brief,  in  the  Psalms  the  utterances  are 
likely  to  be  in  a  decani-cantoris  alternation ;  in  Leaves  of  Grass 
the  whole  passage  is  a  unit.  In  the  former  there  are  usually 
two  ideas  in  each  division;  in  the  latter  there  may  be  almost 
any  number.  But  Whitman  well  knew  the  value  of  contrast, 
as  he  moved  toward  his  cumulative  effect.  Take,  for  instance, 
the  poem  which  gives  the  text  of  his  life-work;  a  study  of  its 
general  form,  special  elaboration,  and  minutely  careful  revision 
will  show  that  no  rhyming  lyrist  was  more  obedient  to  laws  of 
poetical  rhetoric: 

"I  was  looking  a  long  while  for  a  clue  to  J  the  history  of  the  past  for 

myself,  and  for  these  chants  —  and  now  I  have  found  it ; 
It  is  not  in  those  paged  fables  in  the  libraries,  (them  I  neither  accept 

nor  reject;) 

It  is  no  more  in  the  legends  than  in  all  else ; 
It  is  in  the  present  —  it  is  this  earth  to-day; 
It  is  in  Democracy  —  (the  purport  and  aim  of  all  the  past ;)  a 
It  is  the  life  of  one  man  or  one  woman  to-day  —  the  average  man  of 

to-day ; 

It  is  in  3  languages,  social  customs,  literatures,  arts; 
It  is  in  4  the  broad  show  of  artificial  things,  ships,  machinery,  politics, 

creeds,  modern  improvements,  and  the  interchange  of  nations, 
All  for  the  average  man  of  to-day."    ' 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  famous  poem  O  Captain,  my 
Captain,  which  stands  at  the  height  of  Whitman's  attainment, 

1  "A  clue  to"  added  in  1870. 

2  In  editions  before  1860,  "It  is  in  democracy,  in  this  America,  the 
old  world  also." 

3  "In"  added  in  1870.  4  "In"  added  in  1870. 


200  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

is  partially  rhymed  —  some  of  the  rhymes  being  perfect  and 
some  assonantal  —  and  regularly  rhythmical. 

At  the  risk  of  an  anti-climax,  a  few  words  must  be  added  with 
reference  to  humorous  verse,  for  the  reason  that  it  has,  by  its 
very  nature,  been  able  to  extend  the  limits  of  the  possible  vocab- 
ulary of  rhyme.  Comic  poetry  has  the  jester's  privilege,  the 
queerness  of  its  verbal  turns  adding  to  that  surprise  which  is 
its  essence. 

Butler  coined  many  new  rhymes  in  Hudibras,  the  first  poem 
to  have  what  we  call  a  "rollicking"  metre. 

Byron,  at  the  dawn  of  the  nineteenth  century,  set  the  fashion 
for  a  long  line  of  followers  of  Don  Juan ;  after  intellectual :  hen- 
pecked you  all  anything  was  possible. 

Richard  Harris  Barbara's  Ingoldsby  Legends  of  1840-6  was 
a  widely  popular,  and  in  its  time  a  frequently  imitated,  collec- 
tion of  jingles ;  but  it  relied  for  the  most  part  on  whimsical  ideas 
rather  than  rhyme-novelties.  Barham  seldom  went  farther  in 
search  of  the  latter  than  friar  :  squire;  draws :  turquoise :  jack- 
daws ;  gone :  on :  dawn  ;  slower :  before :  door  ;  pious  is :  diocese  ; 
Lord  May'r  :  declare  :  there;  ewer  :  pure:  Namur;  dreams: 
Rheims.  Sometimes  his  jocosities  in  rhyme  —  like  Thackeray's 
"R"  for  "ah"  —  were  typographical,  addressed  to  the  eye  only: 
you :  2 ',  sex :  X. 

James  Russell  Lowell's  chief  contribution  to  the  history  of 
rhyme  is  to  be  found  in  his  humorous  verse.  In  his  Fable  for 
Critics  he  was  not  content  to  run  no  farther  afield  than  had 
Barham.  The  whole  poem  is  a  revel  of  absurd  rhymes.  In 
his  search  for  jingles,  if  he  did  not  find  one,  he  did  not  hesitate 
to  make  one,  as  in  Methusalem :  Jerusalem.  Among  the  other 
rhymes  in  this  poem  are : 

Proper  names: 

wad:  God;  deserving :  Irving ;  Barnaby  Rudge:  judge;  un- 
twistable:  Cristabel;  Jackson's:  racks  one's;  lichens:  Dickens; 
loamy :  Romae ;  have  any:  Daphne;  Beaumont :  moment ;  ver- 
juiced :  Zerduscht ;  shabbily :  Rabelais ;  wry  kink :  Duyckinck  ; 
Fuseli  :  lily;  Homer:  no  more;  Wordsworth:  herd's  worth; 
Bryant :  client;  fright  one :  Aristogeiton ;  unshaken :  Bacon ;  seek : 
Tieck;  rely  on:  scion:  ply  on:  try  on:  eye  on:Zion:buy  one: 
fie  on :  lion :  spy  one :  wry  one :  die  on. 


MODERN  RHYME  201 

With  Latin  words : 

herb  is :  imberbis ;  majorum:  wore  'em;  shabbily :  immedi- 
cabile ;  slippery :  slip  awry :  desipere :  frippery :  skipper  he. 

Identities : 

dialogue: die  a  log;  metaphor:  met  afore. 

Miscellaneous : 

brought  over  .-thought  of  her;  charities:  where'er  it  is;  come- 
outer:  about  her;  crosses :  proboscis ;  direct  you  all :  effectual ; 
dreamily :  simile  ;  fill  his  .-lilies;  forest :  no  rest ;  has  to  risk: 
asterisk;  intrude:  wood  (pun  on  wooed);  irresistible :  whist- 
table;  know  it's  .-poets;  mistress :  kiss  trees;  phylactery :  manu- 
factory; rebels  (verb) :  else;  rebellers :  cellars ;  steps  he :  dyspepsy  / 
sell  us  his :  jealousies ;  store :  lower ;  treeified :  deified ;  toss  over: 
philosopher :  loss  of  her;  vary :  prairie  ;  visit :  explicit ;  war  if: 
tariff. 

In  this  Fable,  as  everybody  remembers,  Lowell  inserted  his 
well-known  characterization  of  Poe,  "three  fifths  of  him  genius 
and  two  fifths  sheer  fudge,"  who 

"talks  like  a  book  of  iambs  and  pentameters 
In  a  way  to  make  people  of  common  sense  damn  metres." 

Less  known,  and  a  surprising  outburst,  is 

"He  [Holmes]  has  a  perfect  sway  of  what  I  call  a  sham  metre, 
But  many  admire  it,  the  English  pentameter." 

Lowell's  Biglow  Papers,  largely  in  Yankee  dialect,  contain 
many  queer  rhymes,  and  many  that  record  local  folk-pronuncia- 
tion. All  through  Lowell's  poems,  jocose  or  serious,  he  shows 
a  willingness  to  turn  or  invent  words  for  his  uses.  Colonel  Hig- 
ginson  once  spoke  of  him  as  "tangled  in  tropes";  certainly,  in 
his  rhymes  as  in  his  ideas,  he  would  have  been  a  greater  poet  had 
he  been  less  concerned  with  his  last  thought  and  its  instant 
effect.  But  sometimes  he  had  a  right  to  let  rhymes  run  loose, 
as  in  the  verses  he  sent  his  neighbor  John  Bartlett,  on  receipt 
of  a  seven-pound  trout, — which  gift  evoked  college  or:  sogdologer; 
tragi-comedies :  aplomb  at  ease;  talents  his :  balances ;  Castaly: 
fast  ally;  moccasins :  stock  o'  sins;  o'er-step  it  half :  epitaph. 


202  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

But  the  most  enjoyable  of  all  the  school  of  "rollicking" 
rhymers  is  Francis  Mahony,  "Father  Prout."  The  apparently 
wayward  but  always  delightful  prodigality  of  the  Reliques  is  its 
constant  charm;  one  never  knows  when  he  is  to  come  upon 
some  new  touch  of  wit  or  humor,  some  clever  translation  or 
paraphrase,  some  ingenious  Greek,  Latin,  or  French  version  of 
a  familiar  poem,  which  Mahony  thereupon  declares  to  have  been 
borrowed  from  his  alleged  newly-discovered  original.  The 
Rogueries  of  Tom  Moore  remains  the  classic  example  of  this  sort 
of  polyglot  fooling.  Mahony's  pretended  French  original  of 
The  Burial  of  Sir  John  Moore  deceived  an  American  magazine 
in  the  twentieth  century. 

Sometimes  Mahony  turns  back  to  the  natural  end-rhyme  of 
mediaeval  Latin,  as  where  O'Meara,  in  The  Watergrasshill 
Carousal,  says  that  in  his  convent  "the  repast  is  divided  into 
three  distinct  periods ;  and  in  the  conventual  refectory  you  can 
easily  distinguish  at  what  stage  of  the  feeding  time  the  brother- 
hood are  engaged.  The  first  is  called,  1°,  altum  silentium;  then, 
2°,  clangor  dentium;  then,  3°,  rumor  gentium."  In  general, 
Mahony's  rhyme-freedom  is  satisfied  with  any  similarity  which  is 
at  once  musical  in  itself  and  appropriate  to  its  theme.  Assonance 
appears  more  frequently  in  his  rollicking  than  in  his  pathetic 
verse.  Pat  Lardner  owes :  blarney  rose  is  as  good  an  example  as 
any.  In  anthem :  grant  him,  and  many  similar  rhymes,  the 
Hibernian  element  is  intentionally  introduced.  Indeed,  in  the 
gem  of  the  book,  The  Shandon  Bells,  the  author  attempted  to 
transfer  to  English  the  assonantal  rhymes  of  the  old  Irish  songs, 
as,  for  instance,  in  the  third  stanza : 

"I've  heard  bells  tolling 
Old  'Adrian's  Mole'  in, 
Their  thunder  rolling 

From  the  Vatican, 
And  cymbals  glorious 
Swinging  uproarious 
In  the  gorgeous  turrets 

Of  Notre  Dame; 
But  thy  sounds  were  sweeter 
Than  the  dome  of  Peter 
Flings  o'er  the  Tiber, 

Pealing  solemnly;  — 


MODERN  RHYME  203 

O  !  the  bells  of  Shandon 
Sound  far  more  grand  on 
The  pleasant  waters 
Of  the  river  Lee." 

But  it  is  interesting  to  note,  in  connection  with  complaints* 
old  and  new,  of  the  burdensomeness  of  the  fetters  of  rhyme, 
that  this  apparently  freest  of  rhymers  strongly  pleads  for  the 
advantages  of  restriction;  he  paraphrases  from  "an  ingenious 
Frenchman,  the  Chevalier  de  la  Faye,"  the  following: 

"From  the  rhyme's  restrictive  rigour 

Thought  derives  its  impulse  oft, 
Genius  draws  new  strength  and  vigour, 

Fancy  springs  and  shoots  aloft. 
So,  in  leaden  conduits  pent, 
Mounts  the  liquid  element, 

By  pressure  forced  to  climb : 
And  he  who  feared  the  rule's  restraint 
Finds  but  a  friendly  ministrant 

In  Reason's  helpmate,  RHYME;" 

and  goes  on  to  say: 

"Prose  may  rejoice  in  its  Latin  designation  of  soluta  oratio; 
but  a  voluntary  thraldom  is  the  natural  condition  of  poetry,  as 
may  be  inferred  from  the  converse  term,  oratio  stricta.  The 
Italian  poet  is  distinguishable  among  his  fellow-captives  by  the 
light  aerial  nature  of  his  fetters ;  and  versi  sciolti  may  be  applied 
to  more  than  one  species  of  his  country's  versification.  This 
will  strike  any  one  who  takes  up  the  libretto  of  an  opera.  Never- 
theless, let  us  envy  not  the  smooth  and  Sybarite  stanza,  nor  covet 
the  facile  and  flowing  vocabulary,  nor  complain  of  the  wild  and 
irregular  terminations  with  which  we  have  to  struggle.  There 
is  more  dignity  in  the  march  of  a  manly  barbarian  than  in  the 
gait  of  an  enervated  fop;  and  with  all  the  cumbrous  irons  of  a 
rude  language,  were  it  but  for  his  very  mode  of  bearing  the  chains, 
a  Briton  will  be  still  admired  as  he  treads  the  paths  of  poetry : 

Intactus  aut  Britannus  ut  descenderet 
Sacra  catena tus  via. 

Epod.  vii. 

I  shall  not  be  accused  of  travelling  out  of  the  record  in  touching 
incidentally  on  this  matter,  which,  indeed,  would  properly  require 
a  special  dissertation." 


204  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

For  rapidity  of  cheery  movement  and  ease  of  elaborate  rhyme 
Richard  Hovey's  Barney  McGee  is  enjoyable;  here  are  clarity: 
vulgarity :  carrotty ;  Chiante  there:  Dante  there :  spumante  there; 
scintillate :  in  till  late  ;  purse  to  you :  thirst  to  you :  worse  to  you ; 
deracinate :  fascinate :  assassinate ;  gab  allay :  Rabelais :  abbey  lay  ; 
Latinity :  honoraficabilitudinity :  vicinity  ;  stammer  in :  Cameron : 
Decameron;  flim-flam  at  all:  sham  at  all:  damn  it  all, 

I  have  spoken  of  Browning's  monometers.  But  the  shortest 
line  in  the  verse  of  any  language,  so  far  as  is  known  to  the 
present  writer,  is  contained  in  the  following  by  George  Arnold,  a 
forgotten  New  York  magazinist: 

"Here, 

With  my  beer 
I  sit, 
While  golden  moments  flit : 

Alas! 

They  pass 
Unheeded  by: 
And,  as  they  fly, 

I, 

Being  dry, 

Sit,  idly  sipping  here 
My  beer." 

Humorous  poetry  naturally  continues  to  be  a  fertile  field  for 
experimentation  in  the  rhyme  art.  In  Punch,  within  the  past  few 
years,  under  the  editorship  of  the  clever  parodist  and  poet, 
Mr.  Owen  Seaman,  have  appeared  many  poems  which  have 
proved  that  the  resources  of  English  rhyme,  in  word  and  arrange- 
ment, are  by  no  means  exhausted.  Thus  in  Back  to  the  Land 
(Jan.  25,  1905)  are  Dagonet:  autowagonette ;  chance  a  lot:  Lance- 
lot; mercy  veil:  Percivale;  plenish  all:  seneschal;  stocked  a  pod: 
octopod.  The  rhyming  of  the  last  word  of  the  line  with  a  following 
word  constituting  a  line  by  itself,  —  as  in  From  a  Sabine  Farm 
(May  30,  1906),  while  not  strictly  new,  is  carried  out  with  a 
cleverness  which  shows  that  Hood's  knack  has  not  been  lost. 
More  Whitewash  (Oct.  17,  1906)  has  disgracefully :  tracefully ; 
unfair  it  is :  barbarities ;  massacre :  alas !  occur;  courtesy :  hurt 
as  he;  be  or  is:  theories. 

In  a  class  by  itself  is  Punch's  Abbreviation's  Artful  Aid,  the 


MODERN  RHYME  205 

only  poem  in  the  language,  as  far  as  I  know,  in  which  fragments 
of  words  are  used  as  rhymes : 

"The  Bard,  at  times, 
Is  stumped  for  rhymes, 

Without  the  least  excuse. 
He  could  defy 
Such  moments  by 

Abbreviation's  use. 
For  words  like  Bucks : 

Or  even  Ess : 
Are  not  a  lux : 

But  a  necess : 

"So  simp:  a  rule 
May  seem  pecul : 

And  make  the  crit:  indig: 
What  matter  if 
The  scans:  is  diff: 

The  meaning  too  ambig:? 
The  net  result 

Lacon:  and  punct: 
Is  worth  a  mult : 

Of  needless  unct : "  etc. 

And  now,  at  the  end  of  our  long  path,  we  must  ask,  once  more, 
the  question  which  has  been  the  underlying  thought  of  every 
preceding  page,  What  is  the  higher  service  of  rhyme  ? 

Rhyme,  of  course,  is  no  mere  ornament  in  modern  poetry,  but 
a  superadded  thing  of  great  importance.  It  beats  time;  it 
arrests  the  attention;  it  is  the  one  thing,  in  the  average  mind, 
which  differentiates  poetry  from  prose ;  it  is  a  help  to  the  memory ; 
it  is,  at  its  best,  absolute  music,  without  reference  to  what  it  means ; 
it  affects,  far  more  than  classical  quantity  could  ever  do,  the  choice, 
sense,  and  arrangement  of  most  of  the  words  in  its  immediate 
environment,  and  sometimes  of  words  several  lines  distant ;  while 
in  many  cases  it  assumes  the  complete  domination  of  the  mind 
which  originally  evoked  it. 

The  final  test  of  rhyme,  as  of  every  artistic  means  toward  an 
end,  is  the  charm  of  the  finished  result.  Better  one  delightsome 
lyric  than  a  library  of  treatises  like  this. 

Is  rhyme,  strictly  defined,  an  essential  element  in  English 
poetry  ?  Clearly  not.  Is  it  a  great  added  element  of  strength  and 
beauty?  The  whole  history  of  our  poetry  gives  an  affirmative 


206  A  STUDY  OF  ENGLISH  RHYME 

answer.  Yet  even  now  there  occasionally  comes  from  some  poet 
or  critic  a  renewal  of  the  old  Elizabethan  outcry  against  it. 
George  Meredith  said  that  "as  quantity  is  denied  to  the  English 
tongue,  rhymes  there  must  be."  "  That  hard,  consonantal  smack 
on  the  ear  of  an  exact  similarity  of  sound  is  required  in  what  is 
called  our  heroic  verse,  which  relies  for  its  effects  on  the  timely 
clapper."  But  "the  many  writers  of  verse  are  wearing  the  poor 
stock  [of  rhyme]  to  shreds."  "An  unrivalled  instrumentalist  like 
Mr.  Swinburne,  prince  of  lyrists,  does  marvels  with  the  language. 
Lesser  men,  however,  correct  their  rhyming ;  betray  the  cramp  of 
their  hand  in  frequent  repetitions  of  the  rhymes."  Others  carry 
their  complaint  farther  than  Meredith,  and  would  revive  the 
attempt  to  dispense  with  rhyme.  The  new  censors  do  not  under- 
take to  revive  the  classical  forms ;  classical  scholarship  is  making 
a  losing  fight  in  these  "practical"  days.  But  the  burden  of 
rhyme  still  rests  heavily  upon  some  who  crave  a  larger  freedom. 
What  more  splendid  effect,  they  say,  can  be  secured  than  that 
attained  by  the  Authorized  Version  of  the  Psalms  or  the  Book  of 
Job?  Therefore  vers  libre,  or  balanced  semi-rhythmical  prose, 
will  be  the  verse-form  of  the  future. 

But,  in  the  broad  view,  the  poets  have  mastered  rhyme,  not 
rhyme  the  poets.  In  it  —  first  in  alliteration,  then  in  end-rhyme 
—  they  early  found  a  great  and  unfailing  means  of  correlating 
ideas  and  giving  perennial  melody  to  words.  Then,  at  the  very 
time  when  unsuccessful  attempts  were  making  to  foist  classical 
quantity  upon  English  stress,  came  blank  verse,  using  that  iambic 
pentameter  which,  in  its  rhymed  form,  had  already  proved  most 
suitable  for  all  sustained  poetry  in  our  vernacular.  Finally, 
end-rhyme,  at  first  a  time-beater,  or  at  best  a  magnifier  of  emo- 
tion, became  so  intimately  connected  with  the  whole  metrical 
structure  as  to  make  "rhyme,"  in  popular  speech,  synonymous 
with  poetry  itself. 

On  the  whole,  notwithstanding  fettering  influences  at  various 
periods,  the  history  of  English  end-rhyme  has  been  marked  by  a 
freedom  at  least  as  great  as  that  of  alliteration.  The  spontaneity 
of  the  early  ballads  was  recovered  in  the  poetry  of  the  nineteenth 
century,  which,  from  the  Lyrical  Ballads  to  Poems  and  Ballads, 
has  shown  a  rhyming  versatility  never  before  equalled. 


MODERN  RHYME  207 

As  in  instrumental  music,  so  in  poetry:  lesser  details  of 
pleasure-giving  change  with  the  centuries,  but  the  aesthetic 
sense,  and  even  the  general  methods  by  which  it  is  addressed, 
remain  the  same.  So,  for  twelve  hundred  years,  the  English- 
speaking  world  has  been  made  better  and  more  beautiful  by  the 
manifold  service  of  rhyme. 


APPENDIX 
EXPERIMENTS  IN  RHYME 

AMONG  the  many  examples  of  rhyme-arrangement  in  stanzas 
considered  in  the  present  study,  I  have  found  none  in  which  (1) 
only  the  first  syllables  of  the  lines  rhyme ; l  (2)  only  the  middle 
syllables;  (3)  rhymes  run  down  through  the  first  and  middle 
syllables,  as  well  as  the  final ;  (4)  the  first  and  last  syllables  of 
the  lines  rhyme.  For  lack  of  illustrations  of  the  effect  of  such 
arrangements  I  have  made  a  few  verses  of  my  own,  which  the 
reader  will  please  consider  experiments,  not  poems. 

The  first,  if  read  aloud,  will  probably  leave  on  the  hearer's  ear 
an  effect  scarcely  different  from  blank  verse : 

LOON  LAKE 

All  the  children  of  the  northern  wood 
Call  across  the  lonely  inland  lake : 
Moose  and  caribou  and  deer  and  fox, 
Goose  and  bittern,  grouse  and  duck  and  jay. 
Life  is  theirs,  and  days  of  forest  joy, 
Strife  and  love,  and  sunshine  after  rain. 

Mark  you  that  clear  cry  a  mile  away? 

Hark !  the  loon,  in  laugh  Aristophanic : 
Ha  ha  ha  ha  !  ha  ha  ha  ha  I 

Who  would  not  be  glad  on  such  a  day? 
Blue  the  sky,  and  fair  the  western  wind, 
Not  a  care  to  trouble  bird  or  beast, 
Spot  that  never  knew  the  thought  of  woe. 
Yet  what  wail  of  anguish  do  I  hear, 
Set  to  all  the  agony  of  the  world  ? 

Mark  you  that  clear  cry  a  mile  away? 

Hark  1  the  loon,  in  chorus  ^Eschylean : 
Aaooa !  aaooa  I 

1  See  p.  73. 
14 


210  APPENDIX 

In  the  second,  the  rhymes  at  the  strong  caesural  pauses  are 
obvious  enough,  but  the  remainders  of  the  lines  seem  like  rather 
abrupt  prose: 

BOOKS  IN  THE   DARK 

I  sit  amid  my  books,  as  twilight  deepens  fast ; 
I  know  them  by  their  looks,  though  now  I  cannot  see 
The  titles  that  they  bear,  for  who  that  loves  his  friends 
Need  have  them  always  wear  their  names  upon  their  backs? 

That  worn  and  rusty  calf,  —  how  well  I  still  recall 

The  dollar  and  a  half  it  cost  a  Freshman's  purse  I 

'T  was  thirty  years  last  June,  but  Shakespeare's  woodnotes  wild 

Lose  something  of  their  tune  in  any  book  but  that. 

My  Kelmscott  Chaucer,  bound  by  Cobden-Sanderson, 
Sheds  a  pale  glow  around  its  regal  rosewood  shrine ; 
And  yet  I  'd  rather  part  with  all  its  splendid  state 
Than  tear  from  out  my  heart  that  Golden  Treasury ! 

It  was  my  noontide  friend,  you  see,  in  schoolboy  days, 
When  I  had  made  an  end  of  the  Franconia  books ; 
And  if  you  chanced  to  see  my  pocket  bulge  still  more, 
The  podgy  cause  would  be  Poe's  poems,  and  my  lunch. 

And  now  the  room  is  dark,  save  for  a  little  glow 
That  shows  a  smouldering  spark  of  life  within  the  grate ; 
Just  light  enough  to  tell  that  on  Ruth's  table,  there, 
The  book  she  loves  so  well,  her  pocket  Browning,  lies. 

Yet  very  well  I  know,  my  thousand  shelf-ranged  friends, 
That  I  could  quickly  go  to  each  one  in  the  dark. 
You  've  lived  with  me  so  much  that  if,  when  eyesight  fails, 
I  greet  you  by  the  touch  you  all  will  understand  ! 

In  the  third,  the  ear  catches  both  the  internal-  and  the  end- 
rhymes,  and  may  or  may  not  perceive  the  rhyming  of  the  first 
syllables : 

NE  PLUS  ULTRA 

Under  the  slope  at  the  top  of  the  hill, 
Wonder  and  hope  and  expectancy  still ; 
When  on  the  height  the  whole  view  is  revealed, 
Then  is  the  sight  but  of  woodland  and  field. 

In  the  fourth,  I  have  found  the  result  the  most  doubtful  of  all, 
some  intelligent  listeners  failing  to  catch  any  rhyme,  while  others 


APPENDIX  211 

have  perceived  it  here  and  there,  but  without  system.  The  four 
illustrations  perhaps  sufficiently  show  why  none  of  the  arrange- 
ments has  ever  approved  itself  to  the  poets : 

THE   FLOWER  OF  TIME 

Primal  chaos,  ere  the  dawn  of  time, 
Knew  the  law  of  order  pulsing  through ; 
Sun  and  star  were  severed,  one  by  one, 
World  and  moon  on  spheral  pathways  hurled. 

Heaven  and  earth  divided,  and  the  seven 
Days  of  God  marched  down  the  eternal  ways; 
Here  the  ocean  shrank  away  in  fear, 
There  the  mountains  climbed  into  the  air. 

When  the  grass  and  flowers  were  growing,  then 
Bird  and  beast  in  wildwood  cry  were  heard; 
Last  of  all,  beneath  the  forest  vast, 
Man  and  maid  in  sportful  joyance  ran. 

So  the  years  of  life  began  to  flow, 

Years  of  love  and  hate,  of  hopes  and  fears, 

All  the  human  happenings  that  fall, 

Peace  and  war,  and  birth,  and  death's  release. 

Yet  for  one  thing,  one,  earth  waited,  set 
Longingly  to  look  with  yearning  strong,  — 
Flower  that  bloomed  in  time's  last  radiant  hour, 
You,  all  life's  perfection,  only  you  1    . 


